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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23721310">Saxons' Café</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/beheadaed/pseuds/beheadaed'>beheadaed</a>, <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/evynyx_pdf/pseuds/evynyx_pdf'>evynyx_pdf</a>, <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reynier/pseuds/Reynier'>Reynier</a>, <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/secace/pseuds/secace'>secace</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Caffè Arturiano [10]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Arthurian Literature - Fandom, Arthurian Mythology</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops &amp; Cafés, Anger Management, Insomnia, Multi, Non-Graphic Violence, Other Additional Tags to Be Added</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 22:22:15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>34,649</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23721310</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/beheadaed/pseuds/beheadaed, https://archiveofourown.org/users/evynyx_pdf/pseuds/evynyx_pdf, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reynier/pseuds/Reynier, https://archiveofourown.org/users/secace/pseuds/secace</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Perceval glanced at the door behind the counter. “Gawain?”<br/>“Mm?”<br/>“Do you know where Aggravaine is?”<br/>“Mm, no.”<br/>“Only it’s his shift too,” said Perceval belligerently, “and he’s never late.”<br/>“‘M sure he’s fine.”<br/>“He’s never late,” Perceval repeated.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Gareth/Lynette</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Caffè Arturiano [10]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2017424</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>28</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. The Newcomer</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Helloooooo, everyone! We are back with our second chronological fic, which in Google docs form is titled "hey you bastards we're back for more." As before, this is a cowriting project between me-- Andra "rey" gawain_in_green-- along with lou "secace" gringolet and eddie "beheaded" pazzeska. We hope you enjoy.</p><p>This chapter was by me and lou. We have merged now. We are one.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>    The morning after the staff and assorted customers of <em>Lionheart Coffee Co. </em>had vanquished the ill tides of rent-paying, a newcomer arrived at the shop. She spent several moments staring at the signs pasted onto the door— an assortment of show flyers, tutoring ads, and friendly pictures of the workers and clientele— and then squinted at a piece of paper in her hand. Only Perceval was awake and un-hungover enough to notice her. Because he was Perceval, he didn’t say anything.</p>
<p>    She swung the door open. A few customers, mainly those who had elected to simply stay the night and avail themselves of ready coffee in the morning, glanced up at her, but all in all she was unobtrusive. Gripping her slip of paper in one hand, she marched up to the counter. “Hi,” she said, “is this the coffeeshop owned by Arthur Pendragon?”</p>
<p>    Perceval considered this. “I think so,” he said eventually. “Can I sell you a coffee?”</p>
<p>    “That’d be great,” she said, tapping her fingers on the counter. She cast her eyes around the shop, considering. It wasn’t a particularly flattering sight; there were bedraggled party streamers hanging from the rafters and, interestingly, a chessboard placed reverentially in the middle of the floor like an altarpiece. “Did you guys have an event here yesterday or something?”
    “Yep!” said Perceval, grinning. </p>
<p>    “Looks like it got a bit crazy,” she commented. </p>
<p>    Perceval nodded seriously. “A cautionary tale not to partake in the water and fruit of the Devil.”</p>
<p>    This was a lot for 9 in the morning. After taking a second to parse the sentence, she decided she did not want to know exactly what it meant, or indeed if it was delivered in seriousness. “That sounds fun,” she said instead. “Can I-- can I get something sweet? What’s a sweet coffee?”
    Perking up at that, Perceval gestured enthusiastically to the blackboard behind him. On it, in a handwriting that vascillated between epitaph and introductory job training manager named Brandy, were written the specials of the week. </p>
<p>“Could I get a hazelnut one?” she said. It seemed the least threatening.</p>
<p>“Could I get money?” said Perceval, holding out a hand.</p>
<p>She passed him a few bills. “Are you a student?”</p>
<p>“I’m trying,” said Perceval, with a certain measure of pathetic peppiness. “I’m Perceval. What’s your name?”
    “I’m Claire. Distant family of the owner’s, trying to reconnect, you know how it is. No better time to track down relatives than a gap year, right?”
    “Right,” said Perceval, who only had family in the sense that a stray puppy adopted by a group of very angry baristas might. Giving her a confused but friendly smile, he turned and began to fiddle with various items that presumably could produce something resembling coffee. </p>
<p>Claire leant on the counter. “So do you know how I could track down Arthur? I’ve never met him and he doesn’t have any social media I can find.”</p>
<p>“He’s out hiking,” said Perceval. This was, it seemed, always the case. “His wife should be in sometime this week, I think she was coming back early for a conference. How long are you staying?” Then, before waiting for her to answer: “You seem nice. I think you should stay a long time.”</p>
<p>Claire took this disarmingly friendly statement with considerable grace considering she had never before had a Perceval encounter. “That’s sweet of you. The town seems lovely, I might stick around a couple weeks. Especially if I can reconnect with Arthur. Oh, thanks.” This last was for the coffee, which he handed to her at a worrying temperature. She barely managed to avoid spilling it on her button-up. “What are you studying?”</p>
<p>“Astrophysics,” Perceval said, trying to balance the tip jar on top of one of the counter’s multiple mini pride flags and failing, sending coins and bills cascading over the floor. “Oh, no. Oh no, oh no, oh no. I am a gerbil in the eyes of God.”</p>
<p>Unsure how to respond to this, Claire helped him gather up the spare change, resisting the inexplicable urge to pocket some. “What happened here?” she asked. The cafe looked like a very sparkly whirlwind had passed through it. Most of the sparkles appeared to be from decorations and the like, but there were several items of glittery clothing discarded in unobtrusive locations around the room. Claire elected not to mention this; it would probably be considered rude to show up at a distant relative’s shop unannounced and then point out their FDA violations. </p>
<p>“A celebratory occasion of merriment,” said Perceval solemnly. “We successfully staged a--”</p>
<p>“--absolutely smashing neighbourhood get-together!” a voice cut in from just behind her. It was the sort of voice one might hear on an overly peppy 6 AM talk show. Claire spun around out of shock and saw a face that, for all its charms, looked less like a sunny radio personality and more like a warning poster for the dangers of higher academia. The man’s curly hair was wild, his eye bags were so dark that it was unclear whether he was sleep deprived or had been punched in each eye, and his smile was disconcertingly wide. </p>
<p>“Oh-- sorry,” she said, moving aside to let him order. He looked like he needed the coffee.</p>
<p>“No worries, no worries,” he said, stepping up to the counter. “Hey, Perce. Twenty shots of vanilla and six things of sweetener, fifteen shots of espresso. Nothing else.”</p>
<p>Both Perceval and Claire gaped in horror. “If Kay finds out I gave that to you, he’ll kill me,” said Perceval. </p>
<p>“Ten shots of hazelnut and extra caramel, and a big fuck you to Kay,” said the man, grinning even wider. He looked moderately unhinged, and Claire felt an instantaneous liking towards him. </p>
<p>“Pulled an all-nighter?” she guessed. </p>
<p>The man laughed and, fingers jittering over the counter, nodded. “Studied all night for a physiology practical,” he said, and before Claire could process any of those words, stuck out his hand. “Gawain. I haven’t seen you around here before. Welcome to Lionheart, just ignore the coffee.”</p>
<p>“Claire,” she said, shaking his hand and tucking the name away. She risked a sip out of her cup. It was the right temperature, at least. </p>
<p>Perceval glanced at the door behind the counter. “Gawain?”</p>
<p>“Mm?”</p>
<p>“Do you know where Aggravaine is?”</p>
<p>“Mm, no.”</p>
<p>“Only it’s his shift too,” said Perceval belligerently, “and he’s never late.”</p>
<p>“‘M sure he’s fine.”</p>
<p>“He’s never late,” Perceval repeated. </p>
<p>Figuring the conversation had turned to matters that did not include her, Claire drifted over to a barstool at the side of the room and, clutching her mediocre coffee, surveyed the clientele. They were an odd lot. At the table by the window, a well-dressed young man with a menacingly formal haircut sat sipping his tea and reading a book. Across from him, there was a man who, despite the winter morning chill, was wearing only a tanktop with the words “I &lt;3 ROMA” and what appeared to be a pair of cargo shorts with handcuffs hanging from the waistband. Occasionally the ostensible police officer would lean over and peer at the other man’s book, but mainly he was doodling senselessly on a spare napkin. </p>
<p>They were not the only odd duo. Two girls sat on the couch, one of whom was probably asleep, and the other of whom was knitting what looked like an entire tapestry. Somehow she had gotten herself tangled in the yarn, but as the other was leaning on her shoulder, she seemed to have decided freedom was not an option. The click-clack of her needles stood out sharply over the faint ambient noise.</p>
<p>There was also, she noticed, someone passed out on the floor by the far wall. She decided not to comment on this or to question it. </p>
<p>So she sat, nursing Perceval’s attempt at a coffee, breathing in the morning and people watching. There was no better place to do it. Just as the tired-looking man-- Gawain-- stumbled over to the table next to hers and collapsed in a bedraggled heap, the door swung in to admit two others. One of them had the general air of a disgruntled Hot Topic employee, and he leaned over the shoulder of the tank top man to peer at the book his friend was reading. “<em>The Coming of Christianity to Anglo-Saxon England,</em>” she heard him say from across the room. “How’s that, then?”</p>
<p>His friend perked up. “Wonderful,” he said, “Mayr-Harting is a leading voice in the field.”</p>
<p>“What field is that, then? Nerd Studies?”
    Raising an eyebrow, Claire snorted into her coffee. Her gap year adventures were already promising much amusement; even if she needed to lurk in Arthur Pendragon’s coffeeshop until he returned from his hike, she would at least be entertained. </p>
<p>“New in town?” </p>
<p>She turned her head. The man at the table beside her, Gawain, had resurfaced from the land of the dead and was regarding her with a questioning gaze. She chuckled. “That obvious? Do I not look like a nice college kid?”</p>
<p>“You look like a nice high school kid,” he said, giving her a quirk of a smile to mitigate the words. “But I know everyone here, and I don’t know you.”</p>
<p>Ah, thought Claire, a <em>character. </em>“I’m from out of town,” she said. “On my gap year. Thought I’d take some time to wander.”</p>
<p>“Wish I’d done that,” he said. “The academic life is certainly best appreciated with a buffer of unstructured chaos. You thinking of coming here?”</p>
<p>“Considering it,” she said, shrugging. “Apps aren’t due for another couple months. Do you like it?”</p>
<p>“Yeah, yeah.” He ran a hand through his hair and only succeeded in making it more distressed. “It’s a great environment, very supportive, you can really do whatever you want. I’m an IR major, econ minor, but I take a lot of classes in all sorts of departments. What are you thinking of studying?”</p>
<p>“Not sure yet,” she said. It was the truth. “I might go into bio, or maybe neuroscience, something like that. Do you know anything about those programs here?”</p>
<p>“Ach, STEM.” He laughed. “I took calc and bio freshman year and vowed never to repeat the experience. I swear, the only people who suffered more than me were my poor professors and anyone who had to sit next to me. The things you do to pass a class…”</p>
<p>This was hardly a rousing endorsement of her interests, and Claire squirmed. “Is university really that hard?”</p>
<p>“Eh, it’s like standardized test classes. But you give less of a fuck and you can send your professors memes.”</p>
<p>“I’ve… never taken a standardized class,” she admitted. </p>
<p>Gawain raised a finger and placed it very carefully in the air as though it was keeping him from falling over. It might have been. He looked like a very tired raccoon. “And you are better off for that,” he pronounced. “I took ten and look how I turned out.” He gestured at himself with one hand. “I think I can taste my thoughts, actually. Can you taste your thoughts? That’s not normal, is it?”</p>
<p>“I don’t have any thoughts to taste,” said Claire. Talking to him was strangely magnetic; she felt an impulse to match his humour. “I chased them out with a broom several years ago.”</p>
<p>He gave her a happy look. “You’re great,” he said, “I hope you stick around. I’d love to chat later but I’m going to take the test for what we in the adult world call Sleeping 301. See you on the other side.” And with that he slammed his head back onto the jacket placed on the table and, to all appearances, exited the realm of consciousness. </p>
<p><em>Interesting</em>, thought Claire. You try to track down a relative and find all sorts of odd friends along the way. She felt a frisson of excitement: she was on her own again, and the world was hers to explore. Taking another sip of coffee, she closed her eyes and listened to the noises of the morning. The faint burble of conversation from inside the store. Outside, the dry rumble of traffic. Music over the stereo system which upon closer inspection would have proved to be a 12-hour remix of <em>Ra Ra Rasputin</em>-- unbeknownst to Claire, the reason Perceval did so many dishes was that there was an unspoken rule that the dish-washer got to pick the music.</p>
<p>A few patrons entered, ordered and left with their coffee as Claire finished her drink and went to the counter for a refill. Percival took her cup, looking regretful.</p>
<p>“I wanted to refill it for free, since you're new, but Kay would get mad and banish me to the kitchen again. I'm actually not supposed to work the register but-” he leaned slightly over the counter and looked at her, his expression grave.</p>
<p>“You won't tell Kay will you?”</p>
<p>She promised not to tell whoever Kay was, and was handed her refilled cup. As she was going to pay, swearing erupted from behind her, causing her to drop the change as she jumped and whirled around.</p>
<p>Gawain was now awake, and soaking wet. Hot Topic Boy was standing next to him with a now empty glass of water, from which one final drop spilled to land on the table.</p>
<p>“Mordred,” Gawain began slowly, “picture me with a fucking fire hose at 3 am tonight when youre asleep.”</p>
<p>“Aha,” said the man, Mordred, “But that was a decoy. The real me was behind you with a knife.”</p>
<p>Claire laughed, standing at the counter watching this exchange. </p>
<p>“That was a body double. I was outside, locking the door and lighting the gasoline to burn the apartment down around you.”</p>
<p>“Wow, God. Don't be a freak, it's just water.” </p>
<p>Mordred placed the glass on the table, as if implying that this, too, was Gawiains responsibility to clean up.</p>
<p>“Don't worry,” Percival noted cheerily, “he's not really mad.”</p>
<p>“If you actually want to see him mad, ask him about Glencoe,” Mordred noted. Claire, unsure what to do with all this sudden attention, merely nodded thoughtfully. This was apparently sufficient.</p>
<p>“Look, the Campbells are murdering bastards, and I'm supposed to just let it go?” Gawain asked, rising from the table to start blearily cleaning up the remains of whatever had happened the previous night.</p>
<p>“It was 400 years ago, so yes,” Mordred said, returning to where he had been hard at work irritating the student of Nerd Studies in the corner.</p>
<p>“That's nothing. I'm still mad about shit from 500 AD.”</p>
<p>“That's pretty impressive,” Claire said, returning to her seat, change back in her purse.</p>
<p>Gawain bowed like an actor on stage before setting to taking down streamers. She settled in to watch and wait. </p>
<p>The morning progressed in a peaceful manner: Claire sipped her coffee, made small talk with various patrons, listened to the chatter. She had nothing much to do, and it was glorious. There was no schoolwork, no housework, and for once no one yelling at her. Her time was her own. </p>
<p>“What happened to your pants, Priamus?” someone said from across the room. She looked up. It was the man who had until recently been passed out by the far wall. He didn’t look much more alive upright than he had when horizontal. </p>
<p>The man in the tanktop laughed and pulled at the hem of his shorts. “Well, Gawain was gone, so I-- I don’t know, I thought it would look cool? Does it?”</p>
<p>“You look like a harlot,” his friend with the book commented. “I told you this. Yet you did it anyway.”</p>
<p>“You didn’t stop me,” the tank top man pointed out. “You were too caught up in your theologically untenable opinions on the Council of Nicaea.”</p>
<p>“They’re not theologically untenable, you were just too busy turning your pants into a stripper’s outfit to fully appreciate that heresy is--”</p>
<p>“What the fuck did you guys do last night?” cut in the hungover man. </p>
<p>Silence. The man who was maybe named Priamus rubbed the back of his neck. “We had a sleepover,” he said. </p>
<p>“You-- <em>Galahad? </em>Galahad, aren’t-- aren’t you <em>ace</em>?”
    Galahad’s lips thinned. “Not that kind of sleepover,” he said testily. “He beat me at chess and then we got to talking and he had some unorthodox opinions about the Problem of Evil, and anyway his-- that is-- we couldn’t find Gawain, and his apartment was very far, so we decided to continue our conversation at my place.”</p>
<p>“He gave me a sleeping bag and I turned my pants into shorts and we listened to Heinrich Schütz together,” finished Priamus.</p>
<p>For a moment it looked as if the man who had so valiantly pulled himself from unconsciousness would make a return to it, but then he staggered forward and clasped Priamus on the shoulder. “Right,” he said. “Congrats on, uh, friendship? Whatever deeply weird friendship you guys have formed. Congrats.”</p>
<p>Then he took a step back and half sat, half stumbled into the nearest chair, putting his head in his hands.</p>
<p>“Mordred…. Coffee? Please? Please Mordred coffee?”</p>
<p>Mordred, who had been reluctantly cajoled into sort of helping with the cleanup, did not spare a glance or acknowledgement of this request. </p>
<p>“For your favorite brother?”</p>
<p>“You aren't my favorite brother. Agravaine is my favorite brother, but only by virtue of being not annoying me currently.”</p>
<p>“How's the ranking go?” Gawain asked, ducking behind the counter to get a cup of coffee for the sufferer.</p>
<p>“Agravaine until the moment he enters a room I am also in, Percival,” Mordred ticked them off on his fingers as he went, “Gawain, Gaheris, Gareth. Am I forgetting one? Whatever.”</p>
<p>Gawain nodded, “Alright. Could be worse.”</p>
<p>“Wait, you guys are all brothers?” Claire blurted out.</p>
<p>“Yes,” Gawain said at the same time Mordred said “No,” and Percival said, “Sort of.”</p>
<p>“Me, Agravaine, Gaheris,” Gawain handed the hungover man a cup and gestured to him, “Mordred and Gareth are brothers, and Percival is an honorary addition, but he's not related to us.”</p>
<p>Mordred pointed to himself, “half brother.”</p>
<p>“Where is Agravaine?” Percival wondered aloud again. The rest ignored him, and business went on, Claire only slightly less confused.</p>
<p>While Perceval was wondering where he was and the rest of the world didn’t much care, Aggravaine was asleep. He had drifted into fitful half-dreams sometime past midnight, restless and still wearing his clothes. He was asleep while Gawain was very definitely not going home, he was asleep while Gaheris stumbled around the cafe kitchen looking for a glass of water, he was asleep while Mordred played Detroit in his bedroom far too early in the morning. He was fortunately asleep while Gareth and Lynette had their own party involving far less chess and far more stripping. Most importantly, he was asleep when his alarm rang. </p>
<p>It rang for thirty seconds with a shrill, blaring sound. Just before it set itself to snooze, he flung out a hand and turned it off. Perhaps he thought he was dreaming. Perhaps he didn’t think at all. </p>
<p>The alarm went silent. Aggravaine slept. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Lancelot was in an odd sort of mood that wasn't quite sad and also wasn't quite happy or relieved. It most closely but still inaccurately may be described as an awkward catharsis, a feeling of waking up from something he couldn't put a name to.</p>
<p>Vivian had left early to open the shop, so he was alone in the apartment, and spent a fruitless hour in it wandering back and forth between various rooms, occasionally picking up objects and putting them back down again and opening and closing windows.</p>
<p>But, faced with two equally viable choices- move to the woods, forget human language and become a feral animal, or talk to another actual human being, Lancelot eventually and with some reluctance opted for the second. This was derailed by ten odd minutes of scrolling listlessly through his contacts and being thrown by the existence of other people.</p>
<p>Finally he dialed a number, leaning against the windowsill and looking out on the street below. It rang for several seconds before being picked up, and a voice, thick with disturbed sleep, answered.</p>
<p>“Heya Lance. What’s up? You okay?”</p>
<p>“Uh…” Outside the window, the birds chirped. He took a deep breath. “Yeah. I am. Hey, Cerise-- are you free right now?”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Eggs</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>A very obvious fork in the road.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>CONTENT WARNING: The second half of this chapter features extensive internal narration from someone with anger management issues. The author in question is writing from experience, and so if you face similar challenges that passage may strike a little close to home. If you want to skip that section, stop after the line break.</p><p>This chapter was cowritten by all three of us!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Lancelot wasn't exactly sure how he had ended up at the personal apartment of world-famous folk rock band Play Not. Oh, sure, there was ostensibly an order of events that had led to him sitting on the couch of world-famous folk rock band Play Not, eating plain brand name cereal out of the box with Tristan Kernow, of world-famous folk rock band Play Not fame, while Cerise was engaged in a good-natured argument with <em>the</em> Isolde Eyre about— well, it wasn't exactly clear.</p><p>    The fact that Cerise was personal friends with the members of world-famous folk rock band Play Not was actually the least weird thing about the current situation. The weirdest thing about the current situation was definitely the pair of socks that Tristan was knitting. </p><p>    “I, uh-” Lancelot started, looking at the half finished project, “why is there a hole where the toes are?”</p><p>    “You need to think of them,” Tristan said confidently, “as the foot version of a titty window.” He seemed completely oblivious to the confusion this statement brought upon its hearer.</p><p>    “Just try not to think about it,” Cerise recommended, the argument having apparently reached a lull.</p><p>    “I try not to think about anything ever,” said the man fiddling with a carton of eggs at the kitchen counter. Lancelot thought he might have been Dinadan Giocondi. This was a lot to process— he was not aware that Dinadan Giocondi was a semi-frequent patron of Lionheart Coffee Co; never before had Lancelot bothered to pay much attention to the other customers.</p><p>    “Uh, I'll keep that in mind.” Lancelot paused. “I mean I won't, I won't keep anything in mind.” </p><p>    “I think. Sometimes, on occasions,” said Tristan, but he didn’t look particularly sure about it. </p><p>    “Oh?” Iseult was stretched out on the counter opposite Dinadan, eating hot Cheetos out of the bag. “When’s the last time you had a thought?”</p><p>    “Hmm.” Tristan pretended to consider it. “When did you put those socks on? The moment before that.”</p><p>Lancelot made a small strangled sound. He was very unsure what was going on </p><p>and was, for once, not sure he wanted to.</p><p>     “I like to imagine he’s joking. I suggest you do the same,” Cerise said, rising from the couch arm she was perched on to go pretend to help Dinadan and attempt to sabotage Tristan's eggs. </p><p>    “Anyway,” said Dinadan, skillfully putting slightly too much salt onto Iseult’s omelette, “it’s nice of you to join us! Where did Cerise pick you up from?”</p><p>    Lancelot weighed the probability of a misunderstanding versus mere colorful phrasing. “We were in the same English class Sophomore year?” </p><p>    “Nice, nice,” said Dinadan, at the same time as Tristan said “ew.” He passed Lancelot the box of cereal and headed for the sink. “Move your butt, Didy,” he said, as he hip-bumped him unceremoniously out of the way to wash his hands. </p><p>    Dinadan stumbled to one side, barely holding onto the egg in his hand. “You want me to drop this egg, Trix?” he said. “Is that what you want? You want me to drop this egg all over our kitchen floor?”</p><p>    “You can do anything you want with the egg and me and the kitchen floor.”</p><p>“That was quite literally incomprehensible,” said Dinadan. He had recovered his place at the sink and was washing a cracked porcelain bowl, presumably for egg business.</p><p>Tristan smirked and headed over to his harp. “This is for you, babe,” he said, and he began to play Despacito, although it was unclear whom he was addressing.</p><p>    The whole morning was beginning to take on something of a surreal tone for Lancelot, who had never before had a friends brunch, least of all at someone’s apartment, and most certainly not with world-famous folk rock band Play Not. “Thank you guys so much for letting me come over. I’m Lancelot,” he added, in the hopes that it would prompt the man who was probably Dinadan into properly introducing himself.</p><p>    “Ahh,” Isolde said confidently, “so you're Lancelot.” She had never before heard the name, mainly because she rarely listened to anything anyone told her, but she liked to cultivate an aura of authority. </p><p>    “Lancelot,” Tristan repeated after her, as though they hadn’t vaguely known each other since Freshman year. Lancelot’s confusion only kept growing.</p><p>    “Uh… yup,” Lancelot agreed.</p><p>    “Wait, what’s your name, again?” Eggs Man gave him a friendly grin. “I don’t think anyone has ever told me.”</p><p>    “Lancelot,” said Lancelot, unsure if he was being mocked. “Sorry.”</p><p>    “What— no, mate, you’re good.” There was the sound of an egg being cracked. “I’m giving you a hard time, don’t worry. I’m Dinadan.”</p><p>    “Didy’s a bit of a dick, unlike me,” said Tristan, who was still playing Despacito and was staring absently in Dinadan’s direction. “And he's not very observant.”</p><p>    “Stop being mean to me,” said Dinadan, popping over to the stove and switching it on. “I’m very sensitive. Cerise, what’s your egg preference? You’re the only person who isn’t bullying me, you get first eggs.”</p><p>    “I’m not trying to bully you!” put in Lancelot, who was very concerned about the impression he might be making. </p><p>    “Yeah, I barely know you, but I dont think it's actually possible for you to bully anyone.” Dinadan paused and considered the nervousness of the man he was addressing. “That's a good thing, don't worry.” </p><p>    Cerise, who was only two months older than him but had several semesters ago decided that she was his cool big sister, returned from the kitchen and reached over to ruffle his hair. “Lancelot’s a good one,” she said. “Sunny side up, please, Dinadan. Love you.”</p><p>    “Love you too.”</p><p>    “Do you love me?” asked Tristan plaintively. </p><p>    “No.”</p><p>    “Ouch.” He clutched his hand to his chest and fell backwards onto the couch. </p><p>    It was in that moment that Lancelot realized that Tristan was wearing a toga, and he only did so because the toga had shifted in a particularly revealing way. </p><p>    “Have some respect for your modesty,” deadpanned Dinadan, unfazed. </p><p>    Tristan sat up slightly and adjusted it to the bare minimum required by decorum. “This was made for someone shorter than me.” No one but Lancelot seemed appalled by Tristan’s fashion choices, so he diplomatically decided not to comment.</p><p>    “So what brings you to our part of town?” Iseult asked. She had shifted her position so that she was no longer lying on the counter and was instead lying on the floor. Dinadan had to step over her every time he crossed from the sink to the stove.</p><p>    Lancelot looked over to Cerise for help and, after a moment of failing to catch her eye, looked back to Isolde. “I— Cerise said you wouldn’t mind.” He almost said sorry, stopped, and took a few seconds to congratulate himself on that.</p><p>    “Nah, nah,” said Tristan, “it’s lovely. New blood is always good.”</p><p>    Iseult shot him a finger gun. “Seconded,” she said. “Sorry, I know we’re a lot. It’s too bad Lynette and Gareth couldn’t make it; you’re friends with them, right?”</p><p>    Pausing, Lancelot ran through a mental directory of “friends,” came up somewhat short, and readjusted his definition. “They’re nice,” he said. It seemed like a neutral enough answer. “Well, Gareth is.”</p><p>    “Lynette’s nice to me.” Dinadan scooped the eggs off the pan with a spatula, plopped them on a plate, and beckoned Cerise over to collect them. “Dunno what y’all are on about. She’s sugar and spice and everything nice.”</p><p>    “Stop quoting Gareth’s journal,” said Iseult, making a vague attempt to kick him from her position on the floor. “Where are they, anyway?”</p><p>    “Take a wild stab in the dark,” Dinadan said, “I’m sure that’s what Gareth is doing right about now.”</p><p>    “Stop it,” groaned Cerise, shoving a forkful of eggs in her mouth. “I’m gonna kill you.”</p><p>    “Eggs?” said Tristan. “Eggs? Eggs?”</p><p>    "I want eggs before Tristan," said Iseult. </p><p>    "You already had an omelette."</p><p>    "And now I want eggs."</p><p>    Dinadan shrugged. "Suit yourself. What kind?"</p><p>    There was a whimpering noise from Tristan's direction. "<em>Me </em>eggs?"</p><p>"No, you Tristan," said Cerise. She made an eyebrow wiggling motion at </p><p>Lancelot, and he stared quizzically back at her. “Lancelot eggs?” she said out loud.     “Fuck!” Dinadan nudged Iseult with his foot and she rolled over once but didn’t deign to move out of the way. “Lancelot eggs! That takes priority, sorry.” </p><p>After far too many repetitions of the word “eggs,” the group found themselves seated around the kitchen island eating, predictably, eggs, and throwing bread at Tristan. He kept trying to catch it in his mouth, failing, and then bemoaning the speed with which Iseult called “five seconds rule!” and grabbed it for herself. Through the window, sun streamed into the room, and Lancelot’s social discomfort gradually faded. They were odd people, but there was something in the group’s energy that he had never before encountered. For all they joked, they were <em>nice </em>to each other. They cared for each other. It made him want to care as well.  </p><p>About an hour and a half into the visit, eggs eaten and plates cleaned, or at least piled by the sink, Cerise pulled him aside in the kitchen. The rest were loudly arguing about Mario Cart in the living room, so there was a semblance of privacy. </p><p>“Are you sure you’re good? You sounded a little out of it on the phone.”</p><p>“I— well—” He wasn’t really sure, in fairness. Nothing had happened, exactly, but—</p><p>“You don’t have to tell me,” Cerise reassured him, misunderstanding his hesitation.</p><p>“No, uh— I just... Gawain—”</p><p>Instantly, her eyes alight with the fires of righteous indignation, she said, “Oh, what the <em>fuck </em>did he do? I’ll fucking kill him!”</p><p>It was far louder than she’d intended, attracting the attention of those in the next room.</p><p>“Oh, are we killing someone?” Isolde called.</p><p>“No!” Lancelot said quickly, then, quieter: “He didn’t do anything, I just—”</p><p>For a moment two images competed in his mind, two smiles. Sense won out.</p><p>“I guess I kind of got a bit disillusioned of— well, him in general.”</p><p>Cerise let out a breath, relieved. “That is, I think, cause for celebration.”</p><p>Before he could say anything, not that he would, she poked her head into the next room.</p><p>“Stop your argument, Lancelot is picking the track,” she announced somewhat proudly. The three of them acceded with minimal grumbling, making room for Lancelot on the couch as they reentered. He took the place they made, the cheerful argument immediately starting up again as they shouted over each other with suggestions. </p><p>The feeling of it all— the morning, the people, the steady buzz of conversation— settled pleasantly over him, and morning passed into afternoon on what he could only consider a hopeful note.</p><p><br/>
</p><p>The nice girl named Claire who triggered a latent paternal instinct that Gawain had not known he possessed had just left the shop for the afternoon when Pelleas walked in. He pushed the door hard enough that it might have scratched the wall had it not been weighted in such a way that it merely rebounded onto him at high velocity. This did not help his morale. He rubbed his bruised elbow and cast one venomous look around the room before his eyes settled on Gawain behind the counter. </p><p>    Gawain, whose shift had just begun, watched him enter with veiled interest. If Gawain’s life could be said to be a carnival, the past twelve hours had been the bit where Stephen King shows up and starts taking notes. Despite his extreme sleep deprivation he felt a strange energy buzzing under his skin. It might have been the espresso he’d been drinking straight from the supply canister, or the zeitgeist of the day, or something in the angles of his thoughts that he wanted desperately to blunt. Whatever the reason, here was a distraction. </p><p>    “You dickbag,” spat Pelleas, marching up to the counter with no regard for the public scene he was causing. </p><p>    “Oh?” said Gawain, raising an eyebrow. His fingers urged to twitch and, with a great force of will, he placed them calmly on the counter in front of him. </p><p>    “<em>Oh</em>?” repeated Pelleas. He had pulled out his phone and was waving it in Gawain’s vague direction. “Everyone is making fun of me!”</p><p>    <em>A-ha</em>, thought Gawain, <em>I’ve got you. </em>He wanted nothing more than to take the cash register and break it without warning over Pelleas’ head. But there were several problems that would stem from that. First, and most importantly, Pelleas would probably die. This would remove any future possibility of violence towards him, either physical or emotional. Also, Gawain would go to jail. “I’m sorry about that,” he said out loud, letting a lax smile hang on his face to indicate that no, he really wasn’t. “Is there anything I can do to make you feel better?”</p><p>    Pelleas stared. “Is there— fuck you, Orkney, you know that?”</p><p>    The whole room was watching now. The world was his stage, and everyone in it spectators to his three-ring circus. “Oh, yes, I know that very well,” he said. A very stupid onlooker might have thought his tone was polite. “Did you just come here to complain or are you going to do something interesting?”</p><p>    Pelleas, who was rapidly realising that he had waltzed straight into another Incident, backtracked slightly. “No, no, I mean— I just— I just thought you should know,” he said awkwardly. </p><p>    “I know.” Gawain leaned forward over the counter until their noses were nearly touching, carefully keeping the grin pinned to his face. “Are you going to do anything about it?”</p><p>    “Um,” said Pelleas, clearly somewhat transfixed by the proximity he had just found himself in, “I’ll… I… I’m gonna fight you! Yeah!”</p><p>    “Oh, you are?” Gawain said softly. </p><p>    With a look like a drowning man surfacing for air, Pelleas pulled himself backwards. “Yeah. I’m gonna kick your ass.”</p><p>    The buzzing under Gawain’s skin had reached a frenzy. “Alright,” he said, drawing back from the counter, “meet you on out the back, then.”</p><p>    With a murmur of nervous excitement, the general clientele formed into a queue and filed behind the counter to get to the back lot. This felt like an event that demanded an audience. Fights were not unheard of on campus, and especially not around Gawain, but they generally didn’t start in a professional cafe setting. This was something new. Something exciting. </p><p>    Someone, maybe Gareth, grabbed Gawain by the shoulder as he passed through the kitchen. Kay was on his day off, and he was the only person Gawain might have listened to, so whoever it was didn’t matter. Distantly, like a voice over the radio, he heard the words “you can’t do this.” They bounced off him. He <em>could </em>do this. He could do whatever he wanted and no one could stop him because he was Gawain fucking Orkney. Anything he put his mind to was his for the taking, including Pelleas’ miserable little life— </p><p>    —and then he stopped himself abruptly and pulled back from that particular cliff face. Where had that thought come from? He had not wanted to think it and it sat ill-shaped in his mind like a letter someone had slipped into his mail without him noticing. For a single moment Gawain felt very frightened of whatever was lurking just behind his eyes. Then he caught sight of Pelleas’ glowering face and cleared all the thoughts away. A fight. Yes, a fight would do him good. </p><p>    The bemused crowd of college students formed a loose circle in the back parking lot as Gawain and Pelleas squared up. Pelleas was taller, notably taller, but he was also scrawny and had the general look of someone who had never once played a sport. Gawain, as the audience was well aware, was Gawain. </p><p>    “So, uh….” Pelleas bunched his hands into fists and gave a couple of experiment jabs into the air. “How do we do this?”</p><p>    “You punch me,” said Gawain helpfully. He was standing casually, his arms loose by his sides. Every muscle in him felt tense, but he couldn’t let that show. If anyone thought he was taking this seriously, he lost. That was how life worked. Everything was a joke, everything was a game, or the player would soon become the played. </p><p>    “Shut up,” said Pelleas, and swung. </p><p>    Gawain dodged neatly, reappearing behind him and tapping him on the shoulder. “Missed.” He ducked. “Missed again.”</p><p>    Pulling back to regroup, Pelleas shook his shoulders. He seemed to have decided that no breath was worth wasting. The two of them circled each other carefully for a moment before he made another rush forward at Gawain, who stepped to one side and stuck out his leg. Pelleas pulled up short just in time to avoid sprawling on the pavement, but stumbled awkwardly. To Gawain, watching his opponent intently, this was the perfect opportunity. Pelleas looked enough of a fool that comedy would be on his side should he indulge in some good bloody-minded violence, and so before Pelleas could right himself he darted forward and slammed his elbow down into the crook of his neck. Then, as the unfortunate recipient of this tactic doubled over, Gawain brought his knee up into the descending chin. </p><p>    There was a nasty crack. It might have been a tooth being dislodged, but there was no time to check. The crowd winced and drew in a breath. Many of the onlookers were realising that this was a lot less fun than they had originally envisioned when they had heard the word “fight.” But— well, it was Gawain, wasn’t it? Just good old Gawain. And Pelleas <em>was </em>being very silly. </p><p>    Spitting out blood onto the gravel, Pelleas recuperated and, in an impressive burst of speed, swung out an arm to give his opponent a glancing blow to the side of the head. Gawain stumbled back, shaking his head as though there was water in his ears. When he looked up, his eyes and face were pale behind his mad curls. The infuriating grin had gone. </p><p>Then, before anyone in the audience had a chance to suggest that perhaps they calm down a bit and discuss things over tea and biscuits, they lunged for each other. There was some brief grappling before Pelleas managed to get Gawain in a headlock for several seconds, and then the other dropped to the ground and flung his elbow backwards into the soft inner part of Pelleas’ thigh. </p><p>Pelleas made a horrible screeching noise and then, to all available evidence, tried to bite Gawain. This was so preposterous that the gathered observers broke out into nervous titters. There was no handy piece of flesh to bite, so Pelleas looked a bit like a dog trying to catch a fly. While he was distracted, Gawain took the opportunity to spring up and deliver a blinding blow to one eye. It was a solid enough punch that, had he been capable of being sparing, the fight would probably be over. </p><p>Whatever frame of mind the previous night had put him in was not a sparing one. While Pelleas was reeling back, clutching his hands to the side of his face, Gawain swung again and took him on the nose. His knuckles firecrackered with bright red pain and he focused on that, the only spot of colour in the white fog around him. The world was his stinging fist and Pelleas, who had presumed to invade his domain and tell him how life worked. What did Pelleas know? It was not even a question worth answering, so as Pelleas stumbled to the ground, Gawain kicked him brutally on the collarbone. </p><p>Then the specks of red on the pavement caught his eye, and colour returned to the rest of the world. He took a deep breath, exhaled shakily, and reached a hand down. “Truce?” he offered. </p><p>Through a mouthful of blood, Pelleas glared up at him, then reluctantly took the proffered hand. Together the two of them managed to get him standing, and he swayed slightly. Almost subconsciously, Gawain readjusted his grip, raised their arms together, and dragged them both into a bow. As they righted themselves, he caught a glint of gratefulness on Pelleas’ face. It was just a show, right? he seemed to be asking. Just a game. Gawain winked as though to let him in on the joke, and if Pelleas thought the punchline was something entirely different than he did, it was no matter. </p><p>They shook hands. The crowd whooped a bit and clapped for them. And then, with the electricity crackling in his veins mercifully muted, Gawain went back inside to make more coffee. </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>&lt;3</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Aggravaine</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Aggravaine.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Please be advised that this chapter contains a lot of internalized negativity about asexuality and lack of drinking, plus discussion of insomnia.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Someone was knocking on his door. Why did they always do that? In high school English they had read a short story about a man who was tricked into being bricked up in a wine cellar, and from hazy recollection, he had been unhappy about it. Agravaine could not begin to see why. If someone offered to brick up his door he would accept, fuck, he would pay for the bricks.</p>
<p>“Fuck off,” he muttered, still half asleep.</p>
<p>The door opened. No one ever listened.</p>
<p>“Are you dead?” Mordred demanded from the doorway. </p>
<p>Agravaine considered the question. “I don't think so? Maybe.”</p>
<p>“Cool. We are going to Bullseye,” Mordred announced impassively.</p>
<p>“No I'm not.”</p>
<p>Mordred pulled out his phone. “I'm your favorite brother and I'm asking you. Let's go to Bullseye.”</p>
<p>“What time is it?”</p>
<p>“Five.”</p>
<p>So he had been asleep for roughly two hours. Great. Very restorative. Agravaine surrendered, being too tired for any serious resistance, and sat up. </p>
<p>“Fuck,” he said, and immediately flopped back down onto the pillows. Mistakes had been made.</p>
<p>“You good?”</p>
<p>“Mm,” he said concommitaly. “Probably. Just… let me change clothes.”</p>
<p>Mordred grimly gave him a strict time limit and shut the door. Hoping he hadn't permanently damaged anything, Agravaine dressed in dark, loose clothes and left his phone on charge, not wanting anything to do with the hated device, practicality be damned. </p>
<p>They walked the few blocks to a shopping complex, and the cool early morning air was starting to make Agravaine feel slightly less like a drowned rat. His brain was unpleasantly foggy, and he felt at once both restless and exhausted. But walking in companionable silence wasn’t unpleasant, really. Mordred didn’t earnestly ask him how he was like Gareth might, or try to distract him with meaningless conversation like Gawain.</p>
<p>And, blessedly, it was early enough that Agravaine was reasonably sure no one he knew would also be out. The reminder that there was a rest of the world, and he would soon have to exist within it and under its observation, was not a pleasant thought.  He tried to banish it to the back of his mind, where it sat heavily in dark discontent, waiting to reemerge like a beast from its lair.</p>
<p>“What do you need here?” Agravaine asked once they were inside, after a few moments of standing in the AC, blinking under the fluorescents and trying to recall where they were and what was happening.</p>
<p>“Uh,” Mordred stalled, having apparently just named the first possible reason he could think of to get his brother out of the apartment. </p>
<p>“We need to get blue hair dye to put in Gareth’s shampoo,” Mordred said finally.</p>
<p>“Oh.” He blinked. “Alright then.”</p>
<p>They ended up jettisoning that plan, after they found an honest to God plastic statue of Jesus Christ, which was the exact level of shoddily made to achieve perfect and inadvertent comedic genius. They bought it, obviously. Mordred had a Plan and Intent about it, which involved the purchase of various other things. What was part of the plan and what was just a random item purchased because it seemed entertaining wasn't clear.</p>
<p>At some juncture they bought a bag of chips, and ended up seated on the floor of the electronics aisles with it open and propped against the shelf. Mordred was on his phone, and Agravaine was staring up blankly at the display screens, which were projecting the image of a cracked desert surface, alternating between that and sweeping dunes. Something about the scene was unsettling to him.</p>
<p>“Shit.”Agravaine said finally. “Work.”</p>
<p>Their shift started at eight, and he could not at present even fathom being there for it. After the events of the previous night, in the state he was in, and in general. He swallowed hard, suddenly feeling sick. “I can't.”</p>
<p>“Don't then,” Mordred said laconically, looking up from his phone. “No one will notice.”</p>
<p>It had probably been intended as a reassuring sentiment, rather then a slap in the face. And yet.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Agravaine struggled to say, without any breath. “You no one will notice.”</p>
<p>Mordred pocketed his phone and rose. “I'll tell you if anything important happens. If anything in that place can be considered important.”</p>
<p>They parted in the parking lot of the shopping complex, Mordred walking unhurriedly off towards Lionheart Coffee Co, Agravaine unsure. It was getting on in the morning towards the time of day when college kids were awake, and he dreaded being in public for that. But the only other option was going back to the apartment and trying to get some more sleep. But he felt oddly and unpleasantly energetic. </p>
<p>Agravaine walked back to the apartment and found himself turning around, wandering the neighborhood directionless, hoping that eventually he would be tired enough to sleep-- and that anyone who recognized him would find the prospect of conversation as loathsome as he did and leave him alone.</p>
<p>Wondering if he should eat something, he went back to Bullseye, but was deterred by the realization he would have to talk with a cashier, a seemingly insurmountable obstacle, and left again.</p>
<p>After a period of time which was impossible to ascertain, he realized with reluctance that he should probably check his phone, in case Mordred had tried to contact him and now believed his brother to be dead in a ditch. Agravaine let himself into the apartment which was, exaltedly, unoccupied.</p>
<p>He deleted every message he had without reading them, except for those from his brothers. It seemed that despite his prediction, something important had indeed occurred.</p>
<p>
  <br/>
</p>
<p>MORDRED: <em>hey theres a big fucking. Meeting thing happening u might wanna b here for</em></p>
<p>MORDRED: <em>you dont have to clock in or anything</em></p>
<p>
  <br/>
</p>
<p>The messages had only been sent a few minutes ago, removing any convenient excuse. The endeavour seemed miserable in every conceivable way, rivalled only by everything else he could do with his time, which was apparently nothing. </p>
<p>So Agravaine left the apartment again, taking the least public route to reach the back door, in front of which he stood for several long seconds. The decision to leave had just been solidified in his mind when the door opened from the inside.</p>
<p>“Uh. Hey,” said Gaheris. It may have made Agravaine feel slightly better to see that his brother looked very properly miserable. “Are you here for the meeting?”</p>
<p>“You are my least favorite brother. Do you know that?” Agravaine would have said, if he was capable of answers consisting of multiple words.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” he mumbled instead. </p>
<p>“Cool. Cool. I was just gonna… pass out in the parking lot,” Gaheris explained gloomily.</p>
<p>“No you aren't,” Gawain interrupted from inside. Gaheris sighed and went back inside, Agravaine reluctantly following. </p>
<p>“Hi, Aggs,” Gawain greeted chipperly. From the bags under his eyes, he hadn't gotten any more sleep than Agravaine had, but he was certainly chipper about it. Oddly, he had a butterfly bandage stuck jauntily to one cheek, from under which purple bruising could be glimpsed.</p>
<p>No one else was saying anything to him, which was almost worse than snide comments or laughter. He followed his brothers into the backroom, hoping no one would notice him. The table was too small for everyone to fit, so he was standing awkwardly against a wall, the flickering overhead light throwing an sickly blue cast over his drained face.</p>
<p>It was a wicked irony that Agravaine was invisible, except when he wanted to be.</p>
<p>“Agravaine,” Kay said, with an even sterner tone than that with which he usually said the names of employees. </p>
<p>“Don’t,” Agravaine breathed, too quiet for anyone else to hear. What he meant by this even he wasn't sure, other than that everyone was looking at him, with pity or hate or both, and it was really, truly awful.</p>
<p>But Kay was having his own brand of terrible day, and was, besides, currently unaware of The Video, having been absent from the party. If he saw anything in Agravaine’s face that pleaded for him to stop, he ignored it.</p>
<p>“Where the fuck have you been? You're aware this is your job, not just a convenient location to be unlikeable in?” he demanded, maybe knowing as he said it that he was being unfair, that it wasn't like Agravaine was the only one who was being a less than ideal employee. Mordred spent all morning hanging around, working on some sort of Catholic arts and crafts project. Gaheris had spent it alternatively sleeping on the floor, sleeping in the back room, and throwing up in the bathroom. Gawain had apparently gotten into a fight. </p>
<p>But he said it anyway, and Agravaine froze.</p>
<p>“Fuck you, Kay,” he managed, and slipped back out the door before anyone could say anything, slamming it closed behind him after a moment of fumbling with the handle. </p>
<p>The door to the backroom closed behind Agravaine, with no one expressing an interest in following. He was almost too out of it to notice the young woman loitering around the counter.</p>
<p>“Uh, Hi,” she said before he could escape out the back. “Do you guys have like a lost and found or something? I think I left my jacket here.”</p>
<p>“No,” Agravaine answered and then, abominably, burst into tears. </p>
<p>She made some wordless exclamation of surprise, but the rest of her reaction was lost on Agravaine. He buried his face in his hands, feeling incapable of moving from the spot on which he was rooted. </p>
<p>“Hey, are you alright?” he heard her ask, having from the sound of it come closer. He tried to say something, anything, but it was impossible. His thoughts refused to form into words, and the rest of him refused to do anything but cry. </p>
<p>Distantly, he heard her saying other things, and felt a hesitant hand on his arm. The next thing he was concretely aware of was that he was sitting on the asphalt of the parking lot out back, and the stranger was sitting about a foot away, looking at him with concern. </p>
<p>“I-- “ he started. Oh, good. Words were happening again. “Fuck.”</p>
<p>Well, it was better than nothing. Maybe. He hated when that happened, he felt so stupid.</p>
<p>“Hey,” she said, “I hope you're not mad that I brought you out here, I just figured you probably didn't want to be in the middle of a coffee shop when you were so upset.”</p>
<p>Agravaine thought about it. “Oh.” That wasn't an answer, he realized after another moment. “It's okay.” Thought about it for another second. He felt too tired to be a person. “Thank you.”</p>
<p>She shrugged, as if to indicate it was natural to extend such kindness to a complete stranger. “I'm Claire, by the way.”</p>
<p>“Okay.” Ah. Fuck. Damn it. That wasn't right. “Agravaine. Is my name.”</p>
<p>There wasn't any flash of recognition in her face. Claire just nodded. He took a few deep, shaky breaths, though his chest was sore for multiple reasons now, to prevent asphyxiation if nothing else. With that accomplished, dehydration was looking like a more likely cause of mortality. It seemed Breathing and Thinking were not as of yet accompanied by Not Crying.</p>
<p>“You seem really tired,” Claire said sympathetically.</p>
<p>He nodded. His brain, coming back on line, was attempting to assess the situation, and was alarmed to see the light filtering through was not a hazy morning but orange afternoon.</p>
<p>“How long have we been-- uh, was I-- What time is it?”</p>
<p>“Around 3pm, it's been about an hour.”</p>
<p>That would probably explain why he felt awful in every way a human person could feel awful. He wiped his face on a sleeve and tried to imagine what the appropriate thing to say was in this situation. She beat him to it.</p>
<p>“Did something happen? You don't have to talk, I mean, you don't know me, but. You were pretty upset.”</p>
<p>“I don’t-- I dont know why I'm crying,” he realized wretchedly. “I'm just so tired and I-- I'm sorry.” </p>
<p>“It's okay,” Claire said. She was studying his face. “I might be wrong but, is Gawain your brother?”</p>
<p>She winced, her expression marked with consternation as she tried to figure out why what she said would cause him to start sobbing again.</p>
<p>“Oh, God, I'm sorry, it was just a guess, I--”    she trailed off, waiting for him to calm down. It wasn’t long. He was now too tired even for sustained sobbing apparently.</p>
<p>“You’re right,” he said finally. “Wish you weren’t.”</p>
<p>Claire gave him a measuring look as if to gently suggest he go on. And he was so tired and not thinking really, any filter was gone, and she was being very nice to him. People weren’t usually nice to him. </p>
<p>“Nevermind. Really. You've--” Done enough? Done more than enough? She was a perfect stranger being nicer to him than anyone else had in a long time, and he was thanking her by complaining about his petty problems. “I'm sorry. I'm fine now.”</p>
<p>Agravaine didn't feel fine at all. He must not have looked it, either, because she made no move to leave despite his weak attempt at a release of obligation.</p>
<p>“It's cool if you want to talk,” Claire said earnestly. “I really don't mind listening.”</p>
<p>“Oh.” He didn't really believe her, and set on succinctness. “Gawain is just-- you know.” Everyone knew. </p>
<p>“I don't, I'm sorry. I just got here yesterday. I just briefly met some of your brothers and coworkers, that's all I know.”</p>
<p>It took a second for him to wrap his head around that. “Well. I mean he’s-- he’s Gawain. And I'm not.” Agravaine said eventually, as if this explained everything. In a way it did. But once he started speaking, he couldn’t seem to stop. “He’s perfect and cool and people like him and-- and he doesn’t cry to strangers in parking lots for no reason! Or for any reason,” he ended lamely.</p>
<p>“Seems like you have reasons to me,” Claire noted. “Besides, how do you know he doesn’t? <em>He </em>doesn’t know <em>you’re </em>here.”</p>
<p>Agravaine shook his head. “You don’t get it. No, he doesn’t do-- anything embarrassing. Ever. And I do, constantly. And. And everyone fucking hates me--” he broke off suddenly because his throat and chest hurt far too much to start sobbing again. After a moment, he continued, in a flat tone of voice. “And I was never good enough. Growing up. I would always get compared to him, and I was never good enough. He-- he got a full fucking ride here, you know?” </p>
<p>“For what it’s worth,” Claire said gently, “I don't think everyone hates you.” She paused like she was stopping there, but after brief hesitation continued. “I wandered in this morning to grab a drink and all the people up front were wondering where you were and seemed worried about you. That’s how I guessed you were Gawain’s brother.”</p>
<p>“Don't lie to me.”</p>
<p>“I'm not. And I know we just met but I don’t hate you. I think you seem nice.”</p>
<p>Based on what, Agravaine wanted to ask, the quality of my sobbing? But his mind shifted to other things, unable to summon the energy to be rude to a stranger. Especially a nice stranger. “Did Gawain? Ask about me?”</p>
<p>Claire blew out a breath, tapping her fingers on one leg. “He said he was sure you were fine.”</p>
<p>“Oh,” he snorted humorlessly. “Not surprising. Why should he think anyone else would be having a shitty time? He doesn’t. Nothing affects him, he has literally no problems.” </p>
<p>“Is that true?”</p>
<p>Aggravaine did a brief mental survey of his family’s history and realised this was objectively false. “No,” he admitted. “But… he doesn’t act like it. Like he’s untouchable, you know? No matter how bad--” He stopped. This was too much to a stranger; she didn’t want to hear this. Unable to resolve his sentence, he buried his face in his hands. </p>
<p>After a moment, Claire nudged him. “You don’t have to talk,” she said, “but you can if it would help. Really. My family isn’t a picnic either, if that’s what’s going on.”</p>
<p>“This is too much,” he mumbled through his fingers. “Are you sure? It’s a lot to explain.”</p>
<p>He could hear the smile in her voice. “Try me.”</p>
<p>“Alright. God, I-- thank you. Thank you so much, I’ve never really talked 
about this with anyone. God, okay. So… My family was pretty well-off. My mother cut contact with her side after she married my father, mainly I think because of some weird shit that went on with Uncle Arthur and Aunt Guinevere. They’re the--” He stopped, gesticulated wildly. “They own this shithole. Well, Arthur does. Aunt Guin’s a lawyer. I’m rambling.”</p>
<p>    “That’s okay,” she said. “Ramble away. I promise, I have nothing urgent to be doing. It’s important to let it all out.”</p>
<p>    Aggravaine thought he might start crying again but managed to squeeze his eyes shut in time to stop it. “Thank you so much. But yeah, anyway, when Gawain was six he was in the backseat and our father was driving and a lorry just came out of nowhere and ploughed into the front half of the car. Obviously that didn’t go so well for our father. I never even really knew him. Gawain says he doesn’t remember anything except the funeral. I think our mother used to be alright before that, but… at least when I was old enough to really register stuff she was just-- really bad. Really, really bad.”</p>
<p>    Dimly, Aggravaine registered her snaking an arm around his shoulders and giving him a squeeze. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had hugged him. It felt nice. One of her braids tickled his nose. “I’m sorry.”</p>
<p>    “Yeah, well… that’s not the point. I’m over that. I mean, I’m not over it, but it’s not why everything fucking sucks right now.”</p>
<p>    Claire huffed a laugh. “Why does everything fucking suck right now?”</p>
<p>    There was no point in beating around the bush. It could be succinctly summarized in one word. “Gawain.”</p>
<p>    “Is he… bad?”</p>
<p>    “No!” Aggravaine shook his head violently as if to clear the suggestion from the air. “That’s not it. It’s not really even that he’s the <em>problem</em>, it’s that <em>I’m </em>the problem. I’m not him. I’m not anything like him. It’s that… look, no matter how bad our mom got, he never acted like it affected him, it was as if he only suffered her for our sake. Twelve years of-- <em>her</em>, after our father died, and its not like that fucking bothered him either!” His voice had grown quiet, his throat sore from sobbing, but no less intense.</p>
<p>‘Every single thing he could have done in high school, he did. And he did it perfectly. He had his dumb 4.0 and he was captain of the cheerleading team and head of the school dance and prom committee and yada yada yada and you know what I did in high school? Absolutely nothing. I didn’t even have any cool hobbies, I just watched dumb online math videos like a fucking loser.’”</p>
<p>“Wait, wait, hold up,” said Claire, but Aggravaine was on a roll. </p>
<p>“He watched our father die in front of him in a car accident! How the fuck does he have his drivers license after that and I don’t? What’s wrong with me?’” Agravaine demanded, then continued before any response could be made, words coming so quickly his tongue could barely keep up.  “He’s only 14 months older but it feels like so much more than that, I-- I can’t drive and I don't drink and I don't have any friends or hobbies or skills and I haven't--” He stopped suddenly. It was hard to tell, with how red his face already was from crying, but it was possible that a flush had spread across his face. “I don’t. He. Gawain is.”</p>
<p>“Popular?” she asked, sounding confused.</p>
<p>“Profligate.” </p>
<p>Claire winced. “That bothers you?” </p>
<p>“I-- yes. I--” Please, the still conscious part of him begged, do not recount your sexual history (lack thereof) to the stranger you met in a parking lot an hour ago. “And I haven’t-- it’s true. The video.”</p>
<p>She blinked. “What video?”</p>
<p>Agravaine was thrown by this, for a moment. He had assumed everyone had seen it, and everyone was laughing at him. But she was new, he remembered. Surely she was the only person in the town who didn’t know. That sentiment was now past-tense, because he found himself, inexplicably, turning on his phone to the video, already open.</p>
<p>He shut his eyes and tried to block out the sound as she played it, the sixteen seconds or so crawling by painfully. But describing it would have been far worse. When it was over she handed his phone back, and he took it, his hand shaking.</p>
<p>“I'm sorry,” she said simply. No aphorisms or false positivity. At least that was something.</p>
<p>“I feel like-- there must be something wrong with me.” Here some old bitterness managed to break through the exhaustion, and the words came out half throttled by clawed resentment. “That really sums it up. People are fucking cheering for him while I --It’s so fucking pathetic,” he finished, almost breathless.</p>
<p>“I wouldn’t say that at all,” she said, then continued, slowly, as if considering her words. “It seems, from what you've said, that Gawain is, well, very far on one end of a spectrum. Not everyone is like that, and there’s nothing wrong with not wanting to do that stuff.”</p>
<p>“But I do,” he realized as he said it. “Kind of. I think.”</p>
<p>“You want to make out with a stranger you don’t like at a party as some sort of weird power play?” she asked skeptically.</p>
<p>“What?” Was that what was happening? “No. God. No.”</p>
<p>“You want to be... profligate?” Claire again attempted to clarify, perhaps slightly teasing, but so clearly without malice even he didn’t bristle at it.</p>
<p>“No! I don’t-- I mean. The video, it’s true. And I wish it wasn’t. I wouldn’t-- not with someone I don’t know well, that’s way too, you know, uh.” Why, he wondered desperately, was it harder to discuss this than actual traumatic experiences?</p>
<p>She thought for a moment, trying to assemble the various sentence fragments into a coherent sentiment. “I think I get what you’re saying. What’s wrong with not wanting that? The, uh, delights of profligacy are not universal.”</p>
<p>He frowned, ignoring the last comment. “It’s-- it’s pathetic.”</p>
<p>“Is there something wrong with someone not wanting to have sex?” she said evenly, as if a point was about to be proved. </p>
<p>“Uh...” He panicked. Was this a trap? This felt like a trap. “No, God, obviously.”</p>
<p>“So,” Claire said, clearly building to a conclusion. “What’s wrong with a circumstantial qualification?”</p>
<p>“I-- this is different,” he protested weakly. </p>
<p>“Why is one fine and the other ‘pathetic?’” she asked pointedly.</p>
<p>“Because I- I'm-- because it’s me,” he breathed out. “Oh.”</p>
<p>She sat back. “Yeah. You aren’t pathetic, by the way.”</p>
<p>“You tricked me,” Agravaine said finally. </p>
<p>She nodded, not unkindly.</p>
<p>“Right. Thanks though. God, I'm so fucking-- I’ve been whining for so long. I'm just so fucking tired, and my chest hurts because I'm an idiot and sl-- Nevermind. Fuck.”</p>
<p>“You want Tylenol? I have some in my purse,” she offered, not commenting on his slip. “And really, I don't mind, I mean it.”</p>
<p>Agravaine took a slow, deep breath in, which was only somewhat shaky. “I don't have any water or anything.”</p>
<p>“Good thing we’re right next to a purveyor of beverages.”</p>
<p>He tensed, the unsteady calm he managed to find threatening to dissipate like mist on an unseasonably warm morning. “I can’t go back inside.” Then he took a breath. Tried to summon up a better emotion. “Yet.”</p>
<p>“I can just go in and get you a glass of water, you’re good,” she offered.</p>
<p>“Okay. Thank you.”</p>
<p>She was definitely not supposed to use the backdoor, but it would take much longer to go around, so she opened it tentatively, peered in, then darted inside. </p>
<p>Agravaine took another deep breath. Those seemed to be doing something, despite the difficulty. Tylenol would help. The world seemed lighter all of a sudden, and although his breathing was still constricted, his head felt clearer. It would be okay. Things hurt, but there were worse problems to have. In all the expansive stretches of human experience, feeling like he could never measure up to his older brother was not the most extreme tragedy. Sometimes what you needed was to know that all suffering mattered, that you had the right to hurt even if other people hurt more. But sometimes it helped to suck in a strangled, hurt-your-ribs breath that nonetheless brought air, and think: <em>at least I’m alive. </em>And you didn’t want that to change. </p>
<p>“I am nothing in the grand scheme of the universe,” said Aggravaine, when Claire returned with a plastic cup of water. </p>
<p>“Um,” she said, staring at him nervously, “to be fair, no one is anything in the grand scheme of the universe.”</p>
<p>He shook his head and reached out a hand for the water and the Tylenol. “No, no. It’s a good thing. Well, not a good thing. It just is. Mathematically, I barely exist. Which means I’m not actually fucking anything up by being a fuckup.”</p>
<p>Claire passed him a couple of pills after he’d taken a sip of water. “Alright, David Brin,” she said. “Are you, like, a molecular determinist or something?”</p>
<p>“What?” said Aggravaine, swallowing the pills. He felt somewhat more like his old self, and tried for a swear just to test. “Who the fuck is David Brin?” It didn’t ring right. It felt too aggressive. “Sorry, I don’t mean that in a mean way.”</p>
<p>“You’re good. David Brin is like… do you read sci-fi?”</p>
<p><em>I don’t read</em>, Aggravaine almost said. “Um, not much.”</p>
<p>“Let’s do something fun,” said Claire, sticking out a hand to help him up. “What do you like to do?”</p>
<p>“I don’t have any hobbies,” said Aggravaine helplessly, and then, with some humour, “that’s part of the problem.”</p>
<p>With a snort, Claire gave him a look that indicated she very much did not believe that. “What’s your major?”</p>
<p>“Math.”</p>
<p>“Do you like math?”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” said Aggravaine, not sure where this was going.</p>
<p>“Why do you like math?”</p>
<p>“I just-- it’s-- it makes sense?”</p>
<p>“God, I wish that were me,” said Claire, patting him on the shoulder. “Alright. Let’s go to a bookstore or something, that’ll be fun. Do you have a favourite bookstore?”</p>
<p>“Uh…” Aggravaine searched his brain for knowledge of any bookstores anywhere. Lynette worked weekends at a bookstore, right? The one by the LGBTQ+ Center? “I think there’s one over on Daniels Way. By the student union. Why are we going to a bookstore?”</p>
<p>“Well, you say you like math, but you don’t know who David Brin is,” said Claire, waggling a finger at him. “Which indicates to me that we should go find you some good science fiction to read.”</p>
<p>This sounded new and scary. “Oh?”</p>
<p>“Not David Brin. Definitely not David Brin. I promise.”</p>
<p>“Okay,” said Aggravaine. He didn’t know what was happening. “Do I have to?”</p>
<p>She stared at him with a no-nonsense expression. “What do you want to do?”</p>
<p>“Sleep,” he said honestly. </p>
<p>“You look really tired. But it’s just afternoon, buddy.”</p>
<p>“I only slept three hours last night. Two hours. I don’t know, my sleeping has been weird.”</p>
<p>“Alright, alright.” Wrapping a comforting arm around his shoulder, she guided him back inside, ignoring his protests that he really didn’t want to be seen. “That’s something else to talk about. But I think you’ve got to get out of this shop, it’s not a great place for you mentally right now.”</p>
<p>This was so brutally true that Aggravaine didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, but since he had spent all his tears, he opted for laughter. “Yeah, yeah. Okay. Do you have a car or something?”</p>
<p>“Nah. I don’t know how to drive. Come on, it’ll be good to get you some fresh air.”</p>
<p>Everything in Aggravaine wanted to say: no, I don’t want to go anywhere, I want to stay here and wallow. But he was too tired to be mean. He would just feel worse and, for once, Aggravaine Orkney didn’t want to feel worse. So he let her steer him through the main cafe area, he head shrunk into his shoulders, and out the front door. Without the shade of the parking lot, the sun was blinding, and he squinted around. What time was it? Had he spent an entire Saturday morning drifting aimlessly from crying location to crying location? </p>
<p>“Okay,” said Claire, once she had managed to propel them in a route towards the student union. She had her phone open to maps and had looked up the bookstore. “So you said you were sleeping bad?”</p>
<p>“Yeah.” There was no point in keeping anything from her now. Somehow in the last hour she had become his sole confidante. “I don’t know, it’s weird, I’ve never had insomnia before.”</p>
<p>“Do you know if it runs in your family?”</p>
<p>“Uh.” None of his brothers had ever complained about it, and Morgause hadn’t been the sharing type. “I don’t know. I mean, Gawain never sleeps, but I don’t think that, like, affects him.”</p>
<p>Claire groaned. “I hate those people. Okay, so take it from someone with chronic insomnia: once you get it because of stress, it’s hard to get rid of, but the big rule is that you can’t take naps.”
    This seemed deeply unfair. “What? Why?”</p>
<p>“It messes up your cicada whatever. You are not allowed to go to bed until at least 9, okay? Just trust me on this.”</p>
<p>They passed one of the big palm trees on the quad. At the base of it there were a few people playing some kind of board game together-- laughing, one of them with a book open beside them. Suddenly Aggravaine wanted to cry again, but he was so exhausted that it didn’t quite happen. “Why are you being so nice to me?”</p>
<p>Claire stopped and braced both hands against his shoulders, staring him in the eyes. She had a very intense stare. “Dude,” she said. “Buddy. Aggravaine. I’m on my gap year. I have nothing else to be doing but meeting interesting people and trying to make their lives better in whatever little way I can. It’s okay. This is what humans do, we want other people to be happy.”</p>
<p>If this was true it was news to Aggravaine. The only thing his family had taught him was that being petty and spiteful was how to survive. “You’re really nice,” he said lamely. </p>
<p>“I try,” said Claire, and pulled him forward again. “Come on, let’s go find some cool books about creepy math matrices or something Neal Steaphenson-y like that. Does that sound nice?”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” said Aggravaine. It was sunny out. He was very tired, but perhaps that was alright. It gave him an excuse to be stupid, instead of being stupid for no reason at all, which was how he usually felt. He tried for a smile. “Yeah, I think I’d like that.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Avoiding Alligators</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Gawain avoids an alligatorial topic. Lancelot avoids an alligatorial person. Priamus avoids actual alligators.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hello!! This chapter was written by me (Rey) and Eddie (Eddie). I wrote the bits where people are sad and he wrote the bits where people are horny for Catullus. Have fun!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>    “As you all know, I am an accredited expert in Hotel and Restaurant Management,” was how Kay started the meeting, without regard for not sounding a bit stuck up. “I know a lot about this sort of thing.”</p><p>    The assembled staff of Lionheart Coffee Co. stared back at him nervously. They were not sure where this was going. </p><p>    Since he didn’t receive any challenges to his supremacy, Kay continued, “So I want you to know that I have the academic know-how to say that this is what we in the business call a <em>bad situation.</em>”</p><p>    “What?” said Perceval, who was doing linear algebra on a stained napkin. </p><p>    “The whole business with Saxons Cafe.”</p><p>    “Oh.” Perceval gave this some thought. “Yeah!”</p><p>    The meeting was already off to a rough start for Kay. “Does anyone have any comments, questions, or suggestions other than ‘what,’ ‘oh,’ or ‘yeah?’”</p><p>    There was some thought. Eventually Gawain raised his hand, or rather, he shoved it vaguely in the air and then managed to keep it there while the rest of his body dangled down from it like a ragdoll pinned to the wall. “Fuck?”</p><p>    “Fuck,” Kay repeated. “Thank you, Gawain, that’s a helpful one.”</p><p>    “No problem, sir.”</p><p>    Kay frowned at him. “How much caffeine have you had today?”</p><p>    “Uh…” He tilted his head, wiping absently at the trickle of blood by his mouth. “Oh, that’s a good point. That’s a good one. Gaheris, chuck me the espresso can, would you?”</p><p>    Gaheris obliged. </p><p>    “We don’t have time to deal with this right now,” cut in Bedivere at the expression on Kay’s face, “so let’s just move on to the reason we’re having a little team meeting. Saxons. I’m pretty worried, guys. It’s not looking good.”</p><p>    “I got one of their annoying little ads on Instagram,” said Gareth sadly. </p><p>    “That’s exactly the problem. We talked with those weird musicians you’re all friends with a couple days ago, if I remember correctly, and they said--”</p><p>    “We’re not friends,” said Gawain, in a tone that would probably not have been as scathing as it was if he was operating on more sleep and less espresso. </p><p>    “Will you <em>shut up</em>?”</p><p>    “Hnhh.”</p><p>    “Thankyou. Gareth, who’s the fellow with the harp that everyone stares at all the time?”</p><p>    “Uh…” An expression passed over Gareth’s face that indicated he did not want to be lumped into the category of people who stared at the harp man all the time, but was concerned that he had been. “Tristan.”</p><p>    “Right. We need to follow up with them on that endorsement, as a first plan of action,” said Kay, steepling his fingers. He managed to give the impression that had there been a table in front of him, he would have rested his elbows on it menacingly. As it was, the backroom was barely large enough for the seven employees in it, much less any kind of furniture beyond stools. “Gareth, you’ll do that.”</p><p>    “I will!” said Gareth, blinking. “Yes! Alright!”</p><p>    “But the most important thing,” Kay continued, “is of course--”</p><p>    “Marketing,” Bedivere said, nodding, at the exact same time that Kay finished with “Sabotage!”</p><p>    “Marketing sabotage,” offered Mordred into the awkward silence. “Let’s get some real good libel in here. Mr Hengist kicked my dog and cannibalized my goldfish.”</p><p>    There was a rattling noise as Perceval poked his head up from under Gareth’s stool. “If Hengy or whoever he is cannibalized your goldfish then that would imply he was a goldfish himself. I don’t think a goldfish would run a coffee shop very well.”</p><p>    “Perceval,” said Kay. </p><p>    “Sorry.”</p><p>    “His hallways aren’t up to regulation size,” Kay forged on, trying valiantly to ignore the building pressure at his temples. “Honestly, it looks as though they sacrificed building integrity for speed, which makes me wonder what else is less than aboveboard. If we could get-- what the <em>fuck </em>is that noise?”</p><p>    “Sorry,” muttered Gawain, who had been kicking the condensed nitrogen canister at high frequency. </p><p>    “Don’t kick the--” Kay stopped, took a deep breath, and then collapsed sideways into Bedivere’s shoulder. </p><p>    No one moved. It was not usual for Kay to show any kind of human emotion beyond annoyance, and so this was new and frightening territory. Finally Bedivere managed to hoist him back up to a sitting position and then cleared his throat. “I think what he’s saying is maybe we should go do a little, uh, you know.”</p><p>    “Say it,” said Mordred. </p><p>    “Just some, uh, well, you get the idea.”</p><p>    “Say it.”</p><p>    “Corporate espionage,” said Bedivere, very quietly.</p><p>    Mordred pumped the air. “Yes! Corporate fucking espionage!”</p><p>    “Isn’t Espionage that annoying frat guy Gawain punched once?” said Perceval. </p><p>    From the depths of Hell, Kay managed to string together several words that made sense and weren’t about his migraine, which was starting to be very bad indeed. “Gawain… you’re good at snooping.”</p><p>    The accused shifted in his stool. “Uh. I guess.”</p><p>    “How would you feel about applying at Saxons?” suggested Bedivere. “It would make sense from what Kay’s told me about your con. If this Hengist fellow thinks you hate your job here, he won’t be surprised to get your CV.”</p><p>    “Yeah,” said Gawain. “I guess.”</p><p>    Kay glared through the pounding at the corners of his eyes. “Can you say something more constructive than ‘I guess?’”</p><p>    “God, I don’t know, Kay, can I?”</p><p>    When Kay had graduated, his advisor had only one piece of advice to give him: when things went wrong, don’t let the staff know they’ve gotten to you. He had not yet internalized this suggestion. “What’s gotten into you today? First you’re picking fights in the parking lot, now you’re giving me lip when you know very well it’s all your sorry asses I’m trying to save in a rough job market, and it’s not like--”</p><p>    “Yeah, yeah,” said Gawain, but he was standing now, hoisting his backpack over one shoulder and still not looking Kay in the eyes. “Yeah, I’m really sorry. I’ve got to go.”</p><p>    “Uh,” said Bedivere. </p><p>    “Come back right now, young man!” snapped Kay, waving one finger wildly in the air and completely disregarding both the danger of smacking Gareth in the face and the fact that Gawain was only five years younger than him. </p><p>    The group held their breath. Even Gawain paused slightly at the door. Then, his knuckles white on his backpack strap, he said: “Shan’t.” The door swung closed behind him. </p><p>    Kay groaned. “That kid…” </p><p>    “Well!” Bedivere said brightly, before the conversation could spiral further, “does anyone else want to be a spy?”</p><p>    For a very tense ten seconds no one said anything. Then Gareth raised a hand. “I’m really good at lying.”</p><p>    Everyone stared at him. “You’ve never lied in your life,” said Kay eventually. </p><p>    “Aha!” He grinned. “That’s exactly what I want you to think.”</p><p>    A shrug would have taken too much energy at this point, so instead Kay just wiggled his arms a bit in a helpless squid motion. “Fine. Whatever. Gareth, you’re officially fired from Lionheart Coffee Co. for… what’s something you could get fired for that would give you a good revenge background?”</p><p>    “Poisoning the coffee?”</p><p>    “No! Jesus Christ, why the fuck would he want to hire you then? Something else.”</p><p>    “Smiling on the clock,” said Perceval. No one was sure whether he was joking or not. </p><p>    Gareth tried not to grin. “That does sound plausible.”</p><p>    “Fired for smiling on the clock... I… alright. Alright.”</p><p>    “Alright,” Gareth echoed, and a sly grin spread across his face. “I’ve got this. Here’s the plan: Lynette applies as well and acts as the problem employee while I slip under the radar. I figure they probably need to hire a lot of people, right? So we go in, she causes some trouble, I snoop. Sounds good?</p><p>    “Yeah,” said Kay, warming to the idea. His vision was going now, but at least now no one was kicking the nitrogen canister. “Yeah, this might work. I’ll need you to be up to date on FDA regulations, of course.”</p><p>    “Of course,” said Gareth with utmost seriousness. “The things that Gawain is always breaking.”</p><p>    “No.” Mordred bared his teeth in something that might have been a smile. “Those are the PDA regulations.”</p><p>    Kay leant back and breathed out through his nose. Perhaps his absentee brother’s terrible coffee shop wouldn’t go under quite yet. Amazing things could be done with the power of crime. “Alright. Gareth, you’re pretty much in charge of everything.”</p><p>    Gareth gave a thumbs up.</p><p>    “I want you all to know,” Kay continued, managing to squint at them through the pounding of his migraine, “that when the culling comes I will fire you all last. Aggravaine and Gawain are going first.”</p><p>    “Yeet,” said Gaheris. </p><p>    “Meeting dismissed.”</p><p> </p><p>    When he emerged from the tiny, cramped back room Gawain did not know much about anything save for the fact that he needed to go very fast. The world was too small, that was it, too restrictive; it didn’t move before him the way wind and air did when he sprinted from one end of the track to the other at 5 in the morning, always early to practice, always so dependable, the first to show up and the last to leave-- </p><p>    He was out of the shop before he knew it, pushing past customers blindly and ignoring a couple calls of hello. Outside. Outside, where the air was sharper and he could break into a sprint, ignoring the thud of his backpack and the fact that he was wearing platform sandals. There was no one on the sidewalk, by chance, although it felt to him as though that was because the sidewalk was <em>his. </em>Of course there would be no one else, no one--</p><p>    “Fuck,” someone swore, and then they both clattered to the ground. Corners were dangerous when you were sprinting mid-afternoon down a busy street. </p><p>    “Ah,” said Gawain, scrabbling to pick himself up without further bumping into the poor blighted pedestrian on the ground beside him. </p><p>    “Ah,” said the pedestrian. </p><p>    Gawain glanced up. “Lancelot?”</p><p>    “Uh…” said Lancelot, and then, looking as though he ideally would have denied it, “yes.”</p><p>    It was already sunny out, but if it hadn’t been, this news would have parted the clouds and brought back the light for Gawain. “Oh, God. Hey. Are you busy right now? Do you want to do something?”</p><p>    “Do what?” said Lancelot, his expression guarded. He had pushed himself to standing now, and for the first time Gawain realised exactly how tall he was. Had he always been slouching before? Was he wearing high heels?</p><p>    Gawain checked. He wasn’t. “Literally anything. Rollerblading? Movie? Pizza? Studying? I have had the shittiest day ever and I really need to just hang out with someone.”</p><p>    “You never wanted to hang out with me before,” said Lancelot. </p><p>    “I--” Gawain blinked. That wasn’t really true. Of course he’d wanted to hang out with Lancelot before, he quite liked him, there had just-- well, he didn’t do that, did he? “Hey, there’s a first for everything. Come on, let’s do something fun.”</p><p>    “Uh…” said Lancelot again. He looked like a very apologetic sea otter. “Uh, no thanks.”</p><p>    This stung far more than Gawain would have expected it to. “Oh. Sorry, if you’re busy, I get that. But really, it would be fun to hang out sometime soon.”</p><p>    “I’m busy all week,” Lancelot mumbled, his voice very small and very low. </p><p>    The clouds drew back and threatened rain in the world of Gawain. “Right. I understand. Well, have a nice day.” He floundered and gripped his backpack tighter. “Enjoy yourself.”</p><p>    Lancelot gave him a weak smile and continued on past him. “Thanks. You too.” </p><p>    Then the sidewalk was empty again, save for Gawain and the sun, which did not succumb to pathetic fallacy and stayed exactly where it had been prior to that absolutely crushing conversation. <em>What the hell was that about? </em>His burst of speed from earlier had left him, so he meandered down the sidewalk, lost in thought. Lancelot had never been so withdrawn with him before. Had he done something wrong? He racked his brains for anything he could have said that would have hurt Lancelot’s feelings and came up empty. Perhaps he was just having a bad day. Gawain was having a very bad day himself and so was sympathetic to other people suffering from the same affliction. But… no, there were very few social cues more easily discernible than <em>I’m busy all week. </em>Lancelot didn’t want to talk to him. </p><p>    Well, that was fine. Gawain had a lot of people he could talk to. </p><p>    Unfortunately none of these people appeared on the street in front of him the way Lancelot had, so he rooted in his pocket for his phone and flipped through his contacts. None of them were named, because there really were a lot of them and he liked to know people’s numbers by heart anyway in case something happened to his phone, but he vaguely knew which area codes were associated with which people. They were mostly the same, with a few outliers. None of them seemed like anyone he wanted to talk to at the moment. </p><p>    Then the area code 666 caught his eye, and he smiled. Of <em>course </em>that weirdly nice gangster Priamus somehow had a 666 area code. He was exactly the sort of person who would be very pleased by that. They had only known each other for about two days, but Gawain was already forming a mental image of Priamus which looked roughly like this:</p><p>    -hot</p><p>    -nerd</p><p>    -didn’t realise he was a nerd</p><p>    (Gawain had never before slept with someone so intent on making allusions to Catullus.)</p><p>    Maybe infodumping about Catullus was exactly what he needed right now. He clicked Priamus’ number and called him, pressing the phone to his ear before he could rethink anything, most particularly things like how he probably shouldn’t be calling his evil landlord’s gun-wielding henchman for casual hangout hours. </p><p>    “Hhh?” said the voice on the other end, after nearly ten rings. “Who is this? How did you get this number?”</p><p>    “Uh… you typed it into my phone two days ago,” said Gawain. </p><p>    “Oh!” There was some scrabbling on the other end of the line. “Fuck, what time is it?”</p><p>    “Four thirty. Ish.”</p><p>    “Oh, not that late. God, I thought I’d slept in. Naps are weird, you know that?”</p><p>    “Right,” said Gawain, and decided to disregard this indication of Sloth, which was in his eyes the only sin that actually counted against you. “Hey, do you want to get pizza?”</p><p>    “With you? Like, right now?”</p><p>    “Right now, yeah. We could also go rollerblading.” He reconsidered his audience. “Or break into the botanical gardens.”</p><p>    “Holy fuck,” said Priamus, his tone admiring. “Absolutely. When and where?”</p><p>    “Ten minutes, Big Octavian's?”</p><p>    “Ten minutes, yeah,” Priamus said, in the voice of someone who didn’t really comprehend anything about time. “Big Octavian’s. Got it. Then we’re breaking into the botanical gardens?”</p><p>    “Please.” Gawain breathed out, a great sense of relief settling over him. This was exactly what he needed. “See you there. Ciao.” He hung up. </p><p>    He walked all the way to Big Octavian’s, and about one minute in the sky inexplicably covered itself in stormy clouds and began to dump rain down in buckets. Gawain looked glowered at it and pointedly ignored the man selling umbrellas on the sidewalk despite being in desperate need of one, and arrived there three minutes late and completely drenched: he was neither fond of tardiness nor of rain and his mood, if possible, had gotten even worse. Priamus was waiting for him next to the door, looking disheveled but completely dry and holding a big umbrella. </p><p>    “Hello Gawain,” he chirped, looking as confused as he looked happy to see him. Gawain sent him back a small wave and did his best attempt at one of his famously radiant smiles. </p><p>    “Hm. Bad day, I see,” said Priamus sympathetically. “Well, luckily there isn’t anything a good pizza can't fix.” Gawain’s smile brightened, but was soon broken up by a series of sneezes. </p><p>    “God, at this rate I’m going to catch pneumonia…” Gawain finally spoke, and accepted the arm that Priamus was offering. </p><p>    Priamus led him inside the dimly lit store and the smell of pizza and frying oil filled the air, with the faintest hint of eucalyptus beneath them. That last was probably Priamus’ cologne, not the pizza, Gawain reflected hazily. Priamus hummed as he sat down in a booth in the corner, right next to a window where the rain was pattering loudly. Gawain sat in front of him and started to peruse the menu, despite knowing what he was going to order before even entering.</p><p>    “So, how’s work?” Priamus asked politely. Gawain respected the man’s commitment to the common decency of small talk and deigned him with an honest answer. </p><p>    “Oh, you know, pretty shit. We’re planning some more crimes I think. I don’t know. Wasn’t paying much attention. You?”</p><p>    “Oh, you know, pretty shit. We’re planning some more crimes I think,” joked Priamus. Gawain bestowed him with a chuckle in response.</p><p>    The waitress, a short and warm-looking woman, arrived before the conversation could take a compromising turn for criminal activities, and asked them what they would like to order. </p><p>    “I’ll have a pepperoni pizza, please. With extra mushroom. And a RedCow, thank you,” said Gawain and flashed an eerily bright smile that contrasted heavily the rest of his appearance. </p><p>    “I’ll have a uh— what’s this about grape and honey pizza?” Priamus asked the waitress.</p><p>    “Ah, yes, the <em>Triclinium Pizza</em>, it looks like an odd combination but I’ve been told it’s quite good!” </p><p>    “Sounds great, I’ll get that one! And an ice tea, thank you. ”</p><p>    “Perfect, they’ll be ready shortly,” the waitress concluded as she left to go place their order. </p><p>Gawain looked incredulously at Priamus. “Grape pizza? Aren’t you Italian?” </p><p>    “I’m not, I’m Egyptian. Though I did study in Bologna… that doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy fun pizza.”</p><p>    “Seem fair… You studied philosophy right?”</p><p>    “Yeah man, moral philosophy! I have a degree and everything. Would not recommend,” Priamus chuckled.</p><p>    “Yeah, I can see how you're using all of those moral teachings while you’re busy henchmanning,” Gawain grinned, small wrinkles forming around his eyes. Priamus grinned back, completely unconcerned with the ethics of his line of profession.</p><p>    “Besides, what use has a barista for Latin and Greek, then?” Priamus quipped.</p><p>    “<em>Colpito e affondato</em>. I don’t know… using Ovid as a tutorial for seducing? I feel like that’s an important part of the work of a barista.”</p><p>    “That <em>is</em> the main purpose of the <em>Ars Amatoria</em>, and I’m sure Mr. Naso would approve of your skills.” </p><p>The foray into ridiculous nerdery pleased Gawain, and he stayed silent for a couple of seconds, pondering. “I don’t think Ovid was straight. I mean, do not ask me to support this claim with textual evidence, there isn’t any. I just don’t think he was,” he stated with the confidence of an academic that had spent months on a thesis titled “Ovid’s Metamorphoses: an analysis of love and sexuality during the <em>Pax Augustea.</em>” </p><p>(He hadn’t, but he had read it at four in the morning while drunk at one point, which he considered to be basically the same thing.)</p><p>    “You’re definitely right, there’s no way the man was straight. I mean have you ever <em>read</em> the <em>Amores</em>? That shit is too sexy to be written by a straight man…” Priamus agreed.</p><p>    “God…” Gawain sighed, “The <em>Amores</em>… I think he would have got on quite well with Catullus.”
</p>
<p>    “Oh yeah, he would have. Horny Elegiac Poets Gang!”
</p>
<p>    “Now <em>that</em>’s a gang I’d join. No offense…”
</p>
<p>    “None taken, Lucius sucks. I was just bored and in need of a job and thought, you know, why not?”</p><p>“That seems fair. You know, if I could time travel I’d quite like to meet Catullus. He seems cool… Maybe I will.” Gawain looked dramatically out of the window, sighing. “Oh, to be a<em> poeta novus… </em> To dedicate my life to <em>otium</em>…” </p><p>“That does sound like the dream life,” said Priamus, “although I think, if i could, I’d like to go to Athens during the Peloponnesian Wars.”</p><p>“To fight?” Gawain asked. “Haven’t you had enough of that?”</p><p>“I have, I’d just love to befriend Alcibiades, and maybe get Plato to call me out for my παρανομια and being a threat to Athenian society or whatever. It seems like good fun…”</p><p>“It really does… And all that betraying? Sounds delightful.”</p><p>Somewhere in the middle of this conversation the waitress had brought the pizza over and, after a while, the two noticed and dropped the conversation in order to inhale the pizza as quickly as possible. This operation was a success, as Gawain hadn’t eaten since yesterday, Priamus was delighted by his unusual pizza toppings and they were both excited for-plant related trespassing.</p><p>“So,” said Priamus, muffled by the last bite of his pizza, “crime time?”</p><p>“Most definitely,” replied Gawain, his smile brightened by the prospects of imminent trespassing. </p><p>As they stepped outside of the Big Octavian’s, the rain had calmed down, settling into a light drizzle, and some rays of sunlight began to peek through the clouds. Priamus opened his umbrella and held it over Gawain’s head, which had slowly dried off in the warmth of the pizza place . Gawain leaned briefly on his shoulder, exhaustion snaking its way through his limbs despite the caffeine, but then he straightened himself, inhaling a deep breath and taking in the scent of rain and lime tree. </p><p>“Alright,” said Gawain, as they arrived in front of the gardens' main entrance. “I know a way in from the side, there’s a wonky fence.”</p><p>“Lead the way, then,” Priamus said, accompanying the words with a dramatic hand gesture. Gawain led them in a quaint little alley on the side of the gardens, the rain finally stopped. Priamus looked down at a pubble and, noticing the lack of little rings of water, took a step away from Gawain and closed his umbrella. Gawain shivered as water splashed from the umbrella on his face, but quickly collected himself and gestured towards a hole in the fence. He snuck through the passage and Priamus quickly followed him, not without getting his shirt caught in one of the sharp edges and tearing it. </p><p>“Wow, trespassing is a crime that never gets old, huh?” said Priamus, as they made their way through the succulent section.</p><p>“It really doesn’t,” Gawain replied, looking with fascination at an enormous cactus. He stretched out a hand to try and touch one of the thorns, but couldn’t reach it, so Priamus leaned over to try to touch it as well.</p><p>“Ow! Christian Dior! Fuck!” A speck of blood appeared on his finger, and he tried to dry it off on his shirt, managing only to stain it. </p><p>“Try holding it up in the air, that usually helps,” chimed in Gawain.</p><p>“Oh, thank you,” said Priamus. “Hey, look at that aloe! Wouldn’t it be fucked up if instead of face cream aloe contained blood? Like you just cut them and blood comes out?”</p><p>“It <em>would </em>be fucked up,” replied Gawain, who was quite fascinated with the idea, “but could you use blood as face cream?”</p><p>“Hell yeah! It’s called a vampire facial I think. It’s one of those real posh treatments.”</p><p>“Interesting. You look tired Priamus, let’s go sit on that bench,” said Gawain, who was growing tired and wanted to rest his feet, but had no intention of publicly displaying Sloth. </p><p>“Sure,” Priamus shrugged and sprawled himself on the small green bench that Gawain had pointed out. Following, Gawain climbed on the bench to sit on the backrest. Priamus gazed over the small stream that flowed in front of them.</p><p>“D’you reckon there are gators in there?” he asked.</p><p>“Don’t think so. I hope not.”</p><p>“Hm. Thank god…”</p><p>Gawain stared at him. “Are you-- do you have a pathological fear of alligators?”</p><p>“Not a fear,” Priamus said, looking shifty, “just a hatred. They hate me and the feeling is mutual, I promise. I look on any body of water with concern.”</p><p>Both of them turned to look back at the stream. “I promise I’ll tell you if any alligators show up,” said Gawain, after a moment.</p><p>“That’s really kind of you, thank you. Anyway, have you read any Xenophon?”</p><p>And so the late afternoon dwindled into evening, the sky faded into cloudless red, and one by one the stars came out. </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Math Department Undergrad Research Opportunities Spring of 20XX-- Work Study Listed</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Various events occur, some good, some bad.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>&gt; lou (Today at 3:15 PM)<br/>&gt;i think when dealing with topics like this its really important not to condone and glorify them. ya know. like its okay to explore characters being math majors and doing math you just cant frame that behaviour as okay you know. and i feel liek the loving attention to detail of "linear algebra" is just a little bit problematic</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>    At precisely 6:17 that morning, Aggravaine had received a text from Gareth which read: <em>talked to kay. Got him to give you the day off, gaheris and perce are covering for ur shift. idk whats up but i hope ur doing a bit better?? ily get some sleep. </em>Aggravaine read it three times because he was very tired and the first two times went right through his eyes and out the back of his head. Then, on the third and victorious try, he gave a small quirk of a smile. The brittle fluorescent light of his night lamp weighed heavily on the pages of the book open in front of him, glaring up at him and giving him a faint headache.</p><p>    The headache was, in reality, sourceable to multiple phenomena. The stress of recent events had reached deep into his brain and flipped some switch that he had not known existed: after passing out at 9:00 PM on the dot, he had slept the sleep of the dead until suddenly waking up at 3:42. Sleep had not greeted him back with open arms. </p><p>So, restless and antsy, he had turned to the pile of books on his bedside table, untouched since his abnormally luxurious book shopping spree with Claire the previous day. The excitement of buying them-- of, for once, buying something for himself as a treat-- had worn into vague stress when he was faced with the realisation that he did not, in fact, know how to open a book and start reading.</p><p> It seemed simple enough. He knew how to open things, and he knew how to read. But the decision of doing so with a book seemed too monumental to contemplate, and so he had watched random YourselfCylinder videos until the appointed time of sleep. But desperation had forced his hand this morning, because he had forgotten to plug in his phone and was thus unable to distract himself with it. </p><p>And so here he was, three hours later, buried a hundred pages into something called <em>The Three-Body Problem. </em>He felt hollow and exhausted, but the horrible lead-weight stress seemed to have left him. There was no room for it in the space between his thoughts and the pages of the book. Fumbling with his phone, he shot back a quick thank you to Gareth, and then took a sip of water to reward himself for having successfully responded to an item of communication. </p><p>The morning drifted on, carrying Aggravaine forward on the backs of words that he found to his amazement he understood. Fiction had always been difficult for him and had presented no escapism because he could never see himself in characters. But here there were <em>numbers</em>. They had crept from his math and physics classes and formed their own world just for him. Before he knew it it was lunchtime, which announced itself by the fact that his reading comprehension was rapidly deteriorating. With a start he realised he had not eaten since the night before.</p><p>Somewhat chagrined, he opened his bedroom (storage closet) door hesitantly, trying to ascertain if getting to the kitchen meant the emotional weight of human interaction. The apartment was mercifully silent in a way that simply wasn’t possible in his brothers’ presence and, thus reassured, he went to the kitchen. </p><p>The comfortably realityless haze of fiction and isolation was gradually wearing off as remembering the existence of the rest of the house because remembering the existence of his brothers, and then school, and then the math class he was missing that, unlike his job-- he had a job, oh god--! His brothers weren’t covering.</p><p>He managed to avoid falling into a pit of despair, but was solidly in a ditch of unhappiness as he sat at the kitchen counter and consumed a disappointing sandwich. Due to Gareth being one of the nicest people currently living, he had put off mortification for another day. Nevertheless, the fact was settling on him that he would, at some point in time-- unless he decided to become a hermit and live in the woods, which he wouldn’t because he liked air conditioning and the internet and regular showers-- have to return to Lionheart Coffee Co.</p><p>This was not a thought he was fond of. Material reality was often upsetting that way. The rest of college stretched out before him a litany of small humiliations, burning himself on the coffee machine, being yelled at by Kay, bitter loneliness, and stale pastries. And having to watch Gawain be competent and well liked the whole time. Some people, fundamentally, were meant to work at coffeeshops, and then other people were Agravaine.</p><p>At approximately the same time, he put his plate in the sink and had a startling if perhaps outwardly obvious realization. It was game changing and it went like this: <em>coffeeshop employment is not an immutable condition. </em></p><p>It took a few minutes for this thought to settle in, and he was sitting at his small desk before it really took hold. He had to have a job, of course, but that job didn’t always have to be at a coffee shop. </p><p>Brain moving startlingly slowly under the weight of this realization, he tried to work to a logical conclusion. He had to have a job. It did not have to be at a coffee shop. So he needed a different job. One that he didn’t hate. But he hated anything that involved customers. Every job would involve customers, except maybe a research internship, but he wasn’t the sort of person who had an internship. Why? Because he’d never been offered one. Why? Because he never applied for anything. </p><p>With the nervous thought that this was surely not allowed, somehow, he opened his computer and--</p><p>Stopped. </p><p>Where did internships live? How did everyone else know this and he did not? When had they sent out the announcement that told people how to do things? What was the protocol, why had no one given him a protocol? Gawain would probably know since he knew everything, but Agravaine would sooner be torn apart limb from limb by wild horses than invite mockery by asking him. And besides, he had an odd feeling like Gawain would be upset if he knew.</p><p>Which left-- oh. No one, really. Ah. Because asking meant he didn’t know and he was pathetic to think that he could even try, he didn’t even <em>have</em> a CV--</p><p>Maybe he could ask Claire. She’d already been far nicer to him that a stranger had any right to be, but it would only take a minute or two, probably. Probably she wouldn’t mind.</p><p>He texted her. <em>sorry to bother you, but</em></p><p>Ah. Oh no. As soon as he’d sent the first half of the message he’d changed his mind. Before he could delete it, the little grey typing box popped up.</p><p>
  <em>It's not a bother!! Whats up :)</em>
</p><p>Nothing. Say nothing!</p><p>
  <em>i know this is a really stupid question but how do i . </em>
</p><p>
  <em>find like. Jobs that arent a coffeeshop like. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>paid internships? maybe. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>idk i know thats a reach</em>
</p><p>She responded immediately. <em>Not really, you’re a math major right? Theres lots of stuff for that i bet :)</em></p><p>
  <em>Heres what you do: go to your email and search something like “math research opportunities spring”</em>
</p><p>He did that, as the three dots indicating her typing danced back and forth like windchimes. <em>Okay?</em></p><p>
  <em>Okay! You should have a bunch of department email advertising research opps. Look through them and email the contacts infos of the ones that look interesting telling them that ur interested and asking about next steps to apply</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I have to send an email??</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Ahh yeah sorry lol. I can help u write it if u want tho </em>
</p><p>Surely he could at least write his own emails. <em>No im good. thank you.</em></p><p>
  <em>Anytime :) good luck! </em>
</p><p>Putting his phone away, he wondered why she was so nice. Was it exhausting? It seemed exhausting. Maybe it wasn’t, maybe it was-- nice. He tabled this, and went back to the screen, to look at internship opportunities. It wasn’t exciting, really, but it also didn’t feel bad, so that was something, probably. His most exciting discovery was that there was one professor whom he remembered vaguely from his linear algebra class who was looking for someone with statistical programming experience to help code topological analyzers. It was even work study, which he googled the meaning of with a general feeling of breaking some unspoken rule. Secrets unveiled themselves to him, more specifically the secrets of funded department research positions for undergrads. This felt like such an accomplishment that Aggravaine decided he had earned a break. So, grinning, he grabbed his book and took advantage of the empty flat to stretch out on the entire couch like a Roman noble at the theatre. </p><p> </p><p>A little under a mile away in the questionable establishment known as <em>Lionheart Coffee Co.</em>, Claire was sitting at a table drinking tea. She had a mission to get to know people, which was currently taking the form of chatting vaguely with a frantic-looking Gawain while he nominally took notes for his 20th Century Middle Eastern Foreign Policy class. </p><p>“The Caucasus is wild, man,” he was saying, gesturing at the textbook in front of him as though it would prove his point, although the page it was open to was in fact about environmental deals between the UAE and Kuwait. “There’s a lot of really incredible history there that got completely removed from the public consciousness because of, you know, imperialism and then the Cold War, which was just more imperialism.”</p><p>“Uh-huh,” said Claire, who didn’t know where the Caucasus was but felt embarrassed saying so. “That’s really interesting.”</p><p>Gawain continued, switching subjects neatly without any apparent train of thought connecting them. “I really just think that the role of the YPG and the Peshmerga is criminally understated in maintaining--”</p><p>Someone called his name from behind him. Glancing up, Claire saw two people waving: a tall woman in a Grateful Dead T-shirt and a figure in a long blue trench coat and a beanie. Seemingly unhearing, Gawain continued talking about whatever he was talking about. She gestured at his friends behind him and eventually succeeded in dragging his attention around. “Oh, hi,” he said. </p><p>The woman grinned at him, her short brown hair flopping into her eyes. “Hey, Gawain. How are you doing? I haven’t seen you around in ages.”</p><p>“Oh, you know, this and that. Been around. Nice to see you too.”</p><p>“Are you okay, man?” said the person in the trench coat. “I haven’t seen you in Queer Theory for ages.”</p><p>“Hahaha,” said Gawain, an easy smile resting on his face, “you know how it is. It’s great to see you guys, though, how have you been? Also, this is Claire, by the way-- she’s on her gap year and I’m showing her the lay of the land.”</p><p>    Claire gave them a wave. “Hi.”</p><p>    “I’m Joconde!” said the woman, nodding. “It’s nice to meet you.”</p><p>    Her friend shot a small smile. “Cade.”</p><p>    In between them, Gawain’s friendly grin stayed fixed to his face. Something about it reminded Claire of a porcelain doll. “So you two are doing well?”</p><p>    “Oh,” said Cade, “things have been a bit stressful lately. Failed a test, but it’s okay because Dr. Pearl is the best and is letting me do a make-up cause of, like, extenuating circumstances.”</p><p>    Joconde gave a thumbs up. “I’m doing pretty decent. Did you hear the department got a windfall? Tons of grant money for students. I mean, I know you’re on your sports scholarship, but it’s still really neat.”</p><p>    “Aw, that’s great. I’m glad to hear it.” Gawain took a sip of his iced coffee. “See you two around, then.”</p><p>    “Have a great day,” said Cade, and the two of them drifted off towards the counter. </p><p>    Once they had wandered out of earshot, Gawain leaned forward over the table confidentially. “I have no fucking clue who those guys are,” he whispered, humour touching his eyes. “Like, none at all. I don’t know what department they’re talking about but-- good for them, I guess. No idea why they thought I should be in their Queer Theory class.”</p><p>    “Weird,” said Claire. The burble of the coffeeshop seemed distant, and she felt distinctly uncomfortable. She almost pointed out that they seemed to know him quite well, but decided against it. “They looked nice, though,” she said, instead of saying <em>I’m not straight and I’m not going to judge you for knowing queer people. </em>She would, however, judge him plenty for pretending <em>not </em>to know queer people, especially after having been shown a video which very aptly attested to his own lack of heterosexuality. </p><p>    “Anyway,” he continued, glancing down at his textbook, “it’s a good class. I’m really glad I’m an IR major. How did you-- Claire?”</p><p>    “Off to-- go to the bank,” she said, shoving things in her backpack. One of the greatest gifts of her newfound freedom was the ability to scoot-scoot away at high velocity from people she had been given reason to dislike. It was an incredible power and she was making use of it now. “Thanks for chatting! Bye!”</p><p>    The textbook stayed open on the table. “Bye,” said Gawain.</p><p> </p><p>    “We’ve fled,” said the girl with the bangs and ballerina bun, “from the evil clutches of <em>Lionheart Coffee Co.</em>”</p><p>    Hengist stared at her. “Uh-huh.”</p><p>    “It’s really scary there,” the young man next to her followed up, his eyes wide. “My boss was so mean.”</p><p>    Hengist remembered his boss very well and could agree he was very mean. “Did you get let go?”</p><p>    “Yeah,” said the man, whose CV announced him to be Gareth Orkney, “I got fired for smiling too much. No joke. Mr. Pendragon said it was rude to smile at customers.”</p><p>    Both of them smiled at him: Gareth Orkney, with his pristine, friendly grin; Lynette Tennyson, with an expression that was close enough to a smile he decided to give her the benefit of the doubt. Their CVs were solid, padded with various part-time jobs through high school and into their first year of university, plus an impressive amount of volunteering on the part of Gareth Orkney. They seemed like nice kids. He had a few more job applicants than slots to fill, but many of the prospective employees were first-time baristas, and training new labour was always a hassle. Besides, the thought of stealing Kay Pendragon’s employees was very appealing to him. “I’ll give you a call tonight,” he decided, and then, to keep them on their toes, added: “if you’re hired, of course. Thank you for your applications.”</p><p>    “Thank you for the interview,” said Gareth, breathing out a sigh of relief. He seemed to do most of the talking for the pair of them-- perhaps Lynette was shy. “It’s been a delight to talk to you. Have a great evening, Mr. Hengist. I can’t wait for you to drive Lionheart Coffee Co. out of every last shred of business.”</p><p>    “Ciao,” said Lynette, and then they were gone. </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Joconde is our name for the lady whom Gawain rescues from the devil in <em>L'Atre Périlleux</em>. Cade is a nickname we gave to Gawain's sidekick in that same text, whose name is either Cadrovain or Cadres. We couldn't remember (both are characters) and were too lazy to check. I'm like 70% sure it's short for Cadrovain, but the difference is that one is Gawain's sidekick and one is a dudebro cheater he beats up. The one in this fic is the sidekick.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. The Book of Revelations</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p><i>Footsteps padded into the flat-- the surprising sound of Gawain not doing whatever it was he normally did on Friday nights.</i><br/>Lou (Today at 18:40): whoever lol<br/>Rey (Today at 18:40): that implies he fucks the same person every single friday<br/>Lou (Today at 18:43): hes got a google calendar</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Warning for very tense arguments and explicit discussion of pretty much everything Aggs has been struggling with for 80 000 words, as well as brief references to foster systems and alcoholism.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The next morning Aggravaine woke up to an email. This was a terrifying occurrence. The only emails he tended to get were department missives, but there in bold at the top of his list of notifications was an email from <em><strong>Vostaert, Pieter</strong></em>, with the subject line “<strong>Re: Work Study Opportunities</strong>.” Aggravaine froze when he saw it. For the first time since the dreadful video, he had slept decently, and so had no excuse to throw his phone across the room and hide under his covers pretending to sleep. He had to open it. </p><p>It was surely a rejection; he wasn’t qualified, he had nothing of note on his CV and his grades outside of math and physics were paltry at best, and besides he was <em>Aggravaine</em> Orkney, the knockoff Orkney product. It would be a Bad Email. </p><p>    His fingers shaking and his breath strangely shallow, he clicked on it. It read:</p><p>    <em>Hi Aggravaine,</em></p><p>
  <em>    Thank you for your email. I’ve actually just received some unexpected funding for work with MatSad. We need students with a lot of free time on their hands to run bug checks for the three-space software in the next update. It IS paid, although we can’t afford anything more than minimum wage. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>    I’m really happy to hear from you-- in all honesty it’s pretty monotonous work, and we haven’t had many interested students. Would you be available to drop by my office next week to chat? I’d love to see if this is a project you’d be a good fit for. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>    Have a great day,</em>
</p><p>
  <em>    Pieter Vostaert</em>
</p><p>
  <em>    Assistant Professor of Mathematics</em>
</p><p>
  <em>    Mathematical Software Association Coordinator</em>
</p><p>He read it. Then, to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating, he read it again while pinching himself repeatedly. The words didn’t change. Pieter Vostaert, assistant professor of mathematics and coordinator for the university’s Mathematical Software Association (which sounded very official to him), was interested in giving him a job interview. What was more, he hadn’t even said the words ‘job interview.’ He wanted to <em>chat. </em>With <em>Aggravaine. </em>In a non-terrifying office capacity, which sounded much less stressful than some kind of a phone interview. This was unheard of. </p><p>    “What the fuck,” said Aggravaine aloud, then tried again for good measure. Nothing changed. The email still sat open on his phone, polite and surprisingly casual. It wasn’t the cool topological statistics position that had most caught his eye yesterday, but it was something. It was paid, and it didn’t have anything to do with serving coffee while one of his brothers slept, one played MCR, and one made out with horrible people on the counter. </p><p>    (In his mental list Aggravaine had left out Gareth. Gareth, if he had known, would have been quite honoured.) </p><p>    Still feeling as though he was doing something illegal, he pressed reply and typed in a quick response. </p><p>    <em>Salutations Professor Vostaert,</em></p><p>
  <em>    Thank you for your kind words. I would be honoured to meet you in your academic office next week at an appointed time. I am free all the time*. Thank you. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>    Thank you again,</em>
</p><p>
  <em>    Aggravaine S. Orkney</em>
</p><p>
  <em>    *If I am not free I will figure it out. I promise. Thank you. Goodbye. Thank you again.</em>
</p><p>He pressed send. </p><p>    <em>There, </em>he thought to himself, <em>that wasn’t so hard. </em>Maybe it was a bit too casual. But Vostaert was an Assistant Professor, and would probably pardon him for any faux-pas. </p><p>    Feeling shaky but accomplished, he got up to go eat instant pancakes. He went about the morning, feeling the glow of good news fighting against the clock ticking down to when he had to leave for his shift. </p><p>    He walked, hoping to burn off nervous energy, and managed to maintain at least some modicum of positive feelings as he stood at the backdoor. Going through the front seemed unmanageable, somehow. The door opened, he slipped into the backroom, clocked in and put on an apron. The only ones there were Gaheris, Percival and Kay, who as far as Agravaine could tell were the three people in the world who didn’t know what had happened. </p><p>    About ten minutes in Kay awkwardly patted him on the shoulder and muttered something about how he was a “decent worker,” a moment which could not be over fast enough for either of them, but nevertheless seemed to comfortably bookend the incident. </p><p>It was, in one word, miraculous: nothing happened. No one said anything. He made mediocre coffee all morning, clocked out, grabbed a quick lunch and went to his two afternoon classes. If there were looks, they were indistinguishable from the normal you-have-pink-hair-in-an-stability-theory-class looks, and no one said anything. The only event of interest was that he ran into Claire outside LCC on the way to the dining hall.</p><p>“Hey, how did the email go?”</p><p>“Uh--” He had a moment of panic which urged him to check his inbox again and make sure it hadn’’t disappeared. Resisting this, he nodded. “Yeah, uh, I got a response. I have an interview, sort of. I think.”</p><p>“Oh my god, that's great! What is it for?” She grinned widely, and he felt himself smiling as well at her enthusiasm.</p><p>He found himself telling her about it as they walked to the dining hall. Claire stopped outside the doors and somehow, in the impressive way that people who had actual social skills did, she became invited to watch movies and hang out at the apartment after his classes. So he had a friend now, maybe, which was odd and disconcerting but perhaps not unpleasant.</p><p>Thus it happened that sometimes in the early evening Claire was sitting on the couch next to two of his younger brothers, all cheerily arguing about what they were to watch as if this was a normal or even natural state of things. Even Mordred, who wandered out of his room to join them, sitting on the floor and arguing passionately for the Christian Mingle movie, was being civil. For Mordred, anyway.</p><p>    Claire was quiet. He could understand that; the combined force of four Orkneys was quite overwhelming. When he glanced over at her while <em>Christian Mingle</em> was loading, she had a faint smile on her face. </p><p>    She caught him looking. “Wait. Can we-- hold on, can we pause one sec?”</p><p>    “Are you Christian Minglephobic? Gretchen Wieners isn’t even on screen yet,” said Mordred, through a mouthful of chili popcorn. </p><p>    “I’m super Christian Minglephobic.” Claire snorted, then sucked in a deep breath. “Actuallly, this is gonna sound wild, but I figure I should, like, tell you guys? Cause you’re being super nice and it’s really-- it’s really nice.”</p><p>    They stared at her. Mordred shoved more popcorn in his mouth. “Uh-huh.”</p><p>    “So-- I have a secret dramatic backstory?” </p><p>    “What,” said Gaheris. </p><p>    Claire tugged at her braids, a nervous smile on her face. “I’m actually not related to Arthur Pendragon. I mean, I am kind of, but that’s not why I’m here. Like, technically, legally I’m related to him. I guess. Now.”</p><p>    This was completely incomprehensible to all of them, even to Aggravaine, who was used to speaking in vague clumps of words. “Yeah?”</p><p>    “I came to find you guys, actually.”</p><p>    Silence, except the crunch of popcorn. Agravaine shot a glare at his younger brother, who guiltily placed the bowl at his feet. </p><p>    Claire opened her mouth, closed it again, and then wordlessly reached into her coat pocket and produced a plain folded paper, which she handed to Aggravaine. Unsure what was happening, he took it. He opened it. He read it. He closed it again. </p><p>    “Holy fuck,” he said.</p><p>    “So, uh,” Claire continued, “here’s the story. I’ve been hearing about you guys for the last five years.”</p><p>    “What the fuck?” said Gaheris. “Why?”</p><p>    “Because she’s our sister,” Agravaine said blankly. Then, as if realizing this for the second time in thirty seconds, “Oh, shit.”</p><p>    There were various exclamations, demands to see the paper-- adoption paperwork, which seemed by all angles they could ascertain, to be official-- and only once it had been passed around and they were looking with something between shock and suspicion at Claire, full name Clarrisant, was she able to continue. “So, I don’t really want to talk about why I was-- I mean-- I got adopted at thirteen. I was in the foster system before that. And then Morgause just rang up my social worker one day, I don’t know how, and offered to adopt any teenager who needed a home sight unseen. And everything was in order with her legally, she had no history of anything shady, so… off I went.”</p><p>    “No history of--” Gaheris began, then stopped. “Oh, god, I fucking hate my dumb rich mother.”</p><p>    Claire-- Clarissant-- broke into giggles. She was remarkably unstressed by the oddities of the situation. “So, I don’t know what she was like with you guys, but I can’t imagine it was great. Cause you all-- I mean, you kind of ran away, which is really impressive, actually. Well done. I’ve done that a bunch and it never worked.”</p><p>    “That’s… I’m sorry.” Aggravaine thought about trying to give her a hug, decided it was a little more physical contact than he was comfortable with, and opted to offer her a sympathetic handshake instead. </p><p>    “Thank you very much, Mr. Aggravaine,” she said, shaking his hand professionally. “Honestly, don’t worry about it, I don’t want to talk about it. This is like-- I mean, it’s kind of a happy story, in the end. Morgause was not anywhere near as bad as some of the families I was with briefly. I think she probably got a lot… mellower after you guys left. She was really protective and didn’t really let me do much, but overall it could have been a lot worse, and it’s over now and I am free! And so I was like-- hey, I should go and actually meet the older brothers that I kind of technically have but have only heard about through Morgause.”</p><p>    “She adopted you as a replacement,” said Mordred woodenly. </p><p>    Gareth glared at him. “Shut the fuck up. Don’t be rude.”</p><p>    “I mean, it’s true,” Claire said, with a light smile, “I’ve always known it was true. It’s an awkward situation for all of us. I’m not here to be dramatic or anything, I just really, really wanted to get to know you on my own terms because in the end you’re the best opportunity I have to find real family. And I wanted to be honest once I kind of got the lay of the land. So, uh, hi. I’m Clarissant Christian Orkney, legally. It’s nice to meet you.”</p><p>    “So you’re internalized Christian Mingle-phobic,” Mordred asked, because addressing the rest of it seemed a bit much honestly.</p><p>    There was a silence, and then Claire collapsed into hysterical laughter. Before long the rest of them were giggling as well, and then Gareth was crying just a bit, but he was Gareth and that was normal.</p><p>    “Okay,” said Gareth, once he had calmed down, “true fact: I ran away in 8th grade for three months and worked at a hotdog stand. I am not making this up. Also, I was sent to weird summer camp every single year, and basically never talked to my brothers until we left. And I didn’t know Gawain until I was, like, eight, because he lived in Rome for three years, don’t ask me why. So you are not the first Orkney to be inducted somewhat late in the game. I’m-- I’m really glad you came to find us, Claire, it’s lovely to meet you and you are so welcome to join our brotherly antics.”</p><p>    “Mingle,” said Gaheris, with no seeming relevance.</p><p>    Mordred gave him a patronizing pat on the shoulder. “Yeah, bud, for sure. Gareth, you forgot my thing.”</p><p>    “It’s really cool that you found us,” Agravaine said, hoping to head this off at the pass and possibly get back on track. For inscrutable reasons, he didn’t like hearing about their cousin Sangremore, with whom Mordred had spent the first five years of his life. </p><p>    In a move that would have been incoherent to anyone else but made sense to them, Mordred unpaused Christian Mingle. They had a lovely and only slightly emotionally repressed time yelling at the screen as the extremely heterosexual events unfolded thereon, for a blissful fifty-six minutes.</p><p>    Then the sound of the front door opening shattered the reverie, and Mordred, who had long ago declared himself sole owner of the remote, paused. Footsteps padded into the flat-- the surprising sound of Gawain not doing whatever it was he normally did on Friday nights. The inhabitants of the couch and floor made a cacophony of greetings, rendered exceptionally unintelligible by the excitement brought by their sisterly news.</p><p>    After a second Gawain appeared in the living room, waved a greeting to Claire, and cast a bemused glance at the screen. “What the fuck are you watching?”</p><p>    “Christian Mingle the Movie.”</p><p>    He blinked at them. “Oh. Jesus.”</p><p>    “He hasn’t shown up yet,” said Gareth, in a passing attempt at sounding cheeky. “Hey, we’ve got big--”</p><p>    “Aggs, you doing better?” Gawain cut in.</p><p>    “Uh,” said Aggravaine, who did not want to talk about any of the times he had very much not been feeling better, “yeah.”</p><p>    “You missed work yesterday.”</p><p>    “Yeah. I was-- going through some stuff.”</p><p>    With a laugh, Gawain tossed his coat onto the back of the couch and sagged onto the armrest, his hands in his pockets. “I go through stuff all the time and don’t miss work about it,” he said mildly.</p><p>    For once in his life Aggravaine had the right words to respond to this. “Yeah, well, I’m not you, and I really needed a day off to sort some stuff out.” If he had left it there it might have been the end of it. They were good words. They felt so good to say that he said them again, somewhat proudly. “I’m very much not you, Gawain, okay? So can you lay off?”</p><p>    “What the fuck is your problem? Need to take another day off?” Gawain asked, with the bitter humourless grin he had at his worst moments, white teeth that could be so clearly pictured bloody, an image that sprang so easily to Agravaine’s mind that he wondered briefly if it was a memory. Then it was gone, and years’ worth of frustration remained. </p><p>    He stood. It felt necessary. “What the fuck is my problem? My problem is the exact same thing it’s always been, Gawain, which is-- it’s <em>you</em>, all the time, everywhere I go, standing in front of me and casting your shadow onto absolutely everything in my life.”</p><p>    At this, Gawain stood too, a movement surely more graceful then the other’s had been, and Agravaine had to actively remember that he was the taller of the two of them; Gawain always <em>seemed </em>taller, more present and alive. But he wasn’t. “What are you <em>talking </em>about?”</p><p>    “What do--” Aggravaine stopped, waved his arms desperately, and then ploughed on regardless of common sense. He felt incredible. For the first time in his life, Gawain was looking at him like he was the only person in the room, like he was the scariest thing in the world. “What do you mean what am I talking about? What on earth do you <em>think </em>I’m talking about? I can’t do a single thing without you dropping some snide comment about how you would do it better, or easier, or wouldn’t bother with it at all. You’re just so-- Gawain, you’re so <em>mean</em>.”</p><p>    Gawain’s expression turned from confused to hurt to furious in the blink of an eye. “I’m <em>mean</em>? How fucking old are you? How is it my fault that you’re mediocre and lonely? I’m so sorry I sacrificed all my fucking childhood for you assholes, I see it gave you a complex.” </p><p>    This was so below the bar it was digging a tunnel through the Earth. “Can you take one tiny little second to reflect on what you just said?” asked Aggravaine. The rest of the room had faded away, the watching eyes had left, and there was only him and Gawain and years and years of unspoken resentment. “I <em>never </em>told you that you had to do everything you did, you just did it and of course I’m grateful! Of course it mattered! That’s not what I’m talking about, and if you think it is, then you’re deluding yourself. I’m talking about every single time you’ve talked about your goddamn GPA or told me to try out for sports or said I should go to a party just for fun, and most of all I’m talking about the fact that I can never say a fucking thing about anything to do with friends without you taking the opportunity to make some jab about the fact that I’m not off hooking up with people every other week!”</p><p>    “Every other week is a very conservative estimate,” Gawain said, that stupid smirk still held tightly to his face.</p><p>    “Congratulations.” Agravaine nearly rolled his eyes. “You’re still really fucking mean and I’m still really fucking sick of you. Do you really not see that you’re making fun of me for not having as much sex as you do?”</p><p>    “I’m not-- that’s not what I’m saying. That’s not what I’m trying to say. I’m just joking, you know I’m joking, you don’t have to overreact about it.”</p><p>    His conversation with Claire of several days ago came back to him all of a sudden. Aggravaine grimaced out a smile. “Would you say that to me if I was ace?”</p><p>    Gawain paled, tried to say something, and only managed to splutter a bit. “I-- I was just joking,” he mumbled again. “Are you ace?”</p><p>    Kind of, but that was none of his fucking business. Liking this thought, Agravaine said, “That’s none of your fucking business. Just because you need constant attention and control to feel anything doesn’t mean I do. You don’t <em>get</em> to know anything more about me. You used up your chances years ago, Gawain. Find someone else to manipulate, if there even is anyone left.”</p><p>    Gawain had lost his cocksure air. Aggravaine felt a rush looking at his brother’s face — maybe he’d finally hit something raw. It was well past time. Gawain’s mouth twitched before he spoke. “You think <em>I </em>need constant attention and control? Where do you think I got it from? Do you even remember—”</p><p>    “Don’t you dare fucking make excuses to me right now,” interrupted Aggravaine. “I know what you think I’m going to say. You think I’m going to say you’re just like Mother. Well, you’re not, and I’m not going to take that obvious easy route, okay? You’re your own brand of asshole and I’m sick of pretending everything that’s wrong with me is me, instead of-- of me wishing I was you. And if you think I’m childish for saying you’re really mean, then that’s on you, that’s not on me, that’s not-- that’s not my personality flaw.” His breath caught, and for the first time since the argument had started he wondered if he would cry. But no tears came. “I’m not childish for wanting to just be myself in a nicer world.”</p><p>    “The world’s been pretty mean to me,” said Gawain, his mouth twisting, “so I don’t see why I have to try so hard to be nice.”</p><p>Suddenly the clouds cleared. Understanding pulled aside a curtain and the view beyond the window stretched out for Aggravaine to see. “You’re not any happier than I am,” he breathed. “But you won’t admit that and you won’t be empathetic and you just hurt people and <em>I</em> <em>hate you.</em>”</p><p>    The words had been said. Everyone heard them, and everyone stared in blanched horror at the ping-pong game. Like a puppet with its strings cut, Gawain slumped against the wall, his eyes sloughing downwards. “Alright,” he said, very quietly, and then repeated himself. “Alright, Aggravaine. Okay. Anyone else have anything they want to say to me?”</p><p>    In the dreadful fraying silence, Gareth raised a hand. “I wasn’t going to tell you until we signed the lease,” he said, his voice small, “but I’m moving out. Lynette and I are getting a flat together.”</p><p>    “Morgause adopted me after you left,” said Claire. </p><p>    “I’m about the same as usual,” Gaheris said thoughtfully.</p><p>    “Cool.” Gawain gave a weak, very shaky smile. “Great. I’m going to leave now.”</p><p>    Feeling hollow but more victorious than he ever had in his life, Aggravaine said, “Where are you going?”</p><p>    “It’s not really any of your business,” said Gawain, his voice tight and higher-pitched than usual, “but if you really must know I’m planning to get incredibly drunk and try not to think about anything for quite a good number of hours. Goodnight.”</p><p>    With that he was gone. His coat stayed on the couch where he had dropped it an innocent ten minutes before. And because his claim was eminently believable, the room sank into a dismal, speckled quiet without any suspicion as to his actual, certifiably non-alcoholic destination. After several moments, Gaheris grabbed the remote from Mordred and pressed play. Christians mingled on the screen. And Aggravaine, proudly, did not cry. </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Pieter Vostaert the math professor was named after Pieter Vostaert the guy who finished the <i>Roman van Walewein</i>, aka the best text ever in existence please read it.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Inevitable Breakdown, The</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>lou (Today at 3:20 PM): converting to catholicism will NOT affect any outstanding warrants<br/>rey (Today at 3:20 PM): this implies lucius thought they would and asked<br/>lou (Today at 3:20 PM): of course. he did a lot of wire fraud he wants to put behind him</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I'm not entirely sure how to warn for this chapter because the triggers are so specific, but in general please be careful if you're uncomfortable with discussion of unhealthy relationships with sex.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>    At 3:17 the following morning, Priamus was very awake, because his laptop was open to Grindr and he was facetiming Galahad.</p>
<p>(Grindr was, inexplicably, the only social media both of them had. Galahad used it as one of his many guilty forays into trying to understand Sinners. Priamus used it for facetime.)</p>
<p>It was in the middle of Galahad’s earnest monologue about Adoptionist heresies that there came a knock at the door. Priamus frowned. People rarely knocked on his door unless they were delivering pizza, but he had not ordered any pizza and was thus quite confused. Also, it was 3:17 in the morning. “Give me just a sec,” he said to Galahad, before rising from the couch and peering through the peephole in the door. What he saw was--</p>
<p>“Hi, Priamus,” said Gawain Orkney, in a more disturbed tone of voice than Priamus would have imagined him capable of. “Can I come in?”</p>
<p>“I’m on the phone with Galahad,” said Priamus dubiously, opting not to explain the reality of Grindr facetime. </p>
<p>“Oh. Okay, sorry. I’ll-- don’t worry about it.” He backed away from the door slightly. </p>
<p>Before he could leave the landing entirely, Priamus unfastened the deadbolt and opened the door a crack. Seen in the flickering fluorescent light, Gawain looked dreadful. His eyes sat feverishly above dark circles, his hair was a mess, and his hands were flitting nervously about his person. Whatever he had come here for was not Priamus’ initial assumption. “Come in, Gawain, Jesus,” he said, and ignored the tinny voice of Galahad in the background telling him not to take the name of the Lord in vain. </p>
<p>With a half-hearted attempt at a gracious smile, Gawain slid through the door, bypassing the shoe rack Priamus pointed at suggestively and instead throwing himself down on the couch. His confidence, normally so alluringly unaffected, looked like a patchwork imitation slapped on for effect. It was something in the way his hands wouldn’t stop moving that broke the illusion. </p>
<p>Worriedly marking this behaviour down as Not Good, Priamus turned to his computer, which was happily haranguing them both about the power of holy words and the defilement thereof by unclean tongues. Instead of taking this opportunity to make a counterpoint on unclean tongues, Gawain grimaced and muttered an apology, which more than his expression or his hands still worrying at nothing in the air, was a concerning departure from normalcy. </p>
<p>Evidently surprised himself, Galahad cut off his speech. “Er… I suppose it’s alright. He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, so.”</p>
<p>“Oh? That’s nice,” Gawain said distantly, and without any evidence trace of mockery. </p>
<p>“Yeah, it’s not too late for anyone to, to turn things around,” Galahad offered generously, unsure whether this advice was helping or what the problem was, but cognizant that there was one. Then the phone rang, and Gawain almost jumped at the sound, hands curling into tense fists for a moment before returning to tapping anxiously against the side of the couch. </p>
<p>Priamus picked up the receiver of his, to the bafflement of all, rotary phone, and immediately regretted this action. “So the paperwork is going through and-- Priamus-- and if you hang up on me again--! Okay, so...” Lucius continued to talk about his divorce without waiting for a response.</p>
<p>Three problems presented themselves, and for a moment he glanced back and forth-- Galahad, Lucius, Gawain-- before making a snap decision. Picking up his desktop computer, monitor and keyboard and dragging the phone behind him, stretching the cord to its full length, he hurriedly told Galahad to, “distract him!” and arranged the two across from each other on the middle shelf of his refrigerator. Gawain watched this impassively, giving a lackadaisical wave to the retreating computer as the tinny voice wished him a good evening.</p>
<p>Two issues resolved Priamus returned to the thorniest, by sitting, not very comfortably, on the coffee table, since Gawain was doing his utmost to take up the entire couch. “So, you don’t look-- great.”</p>
<p>“That’s mean,” Gawain said, in what was intended to be a joke but came out too small to land. </p>
<p>Politely, Priamus apologized anyway. “I’m sorry. Are you alright? I ask, not because you look like you haven’t slept in five years, but because it is now 3:19 am. Also, how do you know my address?” </p>
<p>With a look of miserable suspicion, Gawain pulled himself into something like a sitting position. “You wrote it on the back of a postcard from Bari advertising cheap mimosas and said to hit you up if I was ever bored.” He paused. Then: “You’re not a good person, are you, Priamus?” with as little value judgement as such a statement could be uttered with.</p>
<p>He shrugged. “No, mostly not. Why?” </p>
<p>“So you’ll, you know, get it. I’m also not a good person, I’ve been told.” Here he crossed his arms over his chest in a halfhearted attempt at stillness. “And I don’t-- talk to people.”</p>
<p>“You wanted to talk?” he asked, less a kind offer and more actual confusion. </p>
<p>Despite the intention, that was how Gawain took it. “Not really. I broke a bunch of shit at Saxons. I broke in about an hour ago.”</p>
<p>“I see,” Priamus said evenly. “Would I get anything out of asking why?”</p>
<p>“No. I fought with my brother.” He frowned. “No. I think I must have.”</p>
<p>Priamus took a moment to untangle this. “What about? Which brother?”</p>
<p>“He <em>hates</em> me,” Gawain said breathlessly, not listening.</p>
<p>Having learned his lesson, Priamus just settled as comfortably as he could on the coffee table and waited for more information to be forthcoming.</p>
<p>“Agravaine hates me and Gareth is moving out, because he hates me too, probably,” Gawain proclaimed bitterly into the silence. “It’s all-- coming apart, I can’t keep everything together. I’ve been ruining everything this whole time and I didn’t-- I’m a fucking idiot, I guess, and how have I just realized that no one actually likes me?”</p>
<p>“I don’t think that’s accurate--” Priamus tried, but Gawain seemed insensible to him, staring up at the ceiling with something manic on his face. </p>
<p>“No one likes me. Somehow I didn’t realise that no one likes me? I thought--” He paused in a moment of self-reflection, ran a hand through his hair, and gave a short bark of laughter. “I thought everyone liked me.”</p>
<p>This had been Priamus’ impression as well, although he felt that saying so was probably not what Gawain needed in the moment. He opted for a more reassuring middle ground. “Some people are always going to not like you. I mean, I’ve only known you for like a week, but I think there are also a lot of people who do like you, and definitely care what you think.”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” said Gawain, in a voice so hollow it would float, “yeah, I’m realising that apparently people care very much about what I think. And that I’ve kind of always known that, and so if they hate me for what I say I think, then it’s my fault.”</p>
<p>“Uh-huh,” Priamus said. He didn’t entirely know what was going on. There was clearly some kind of a brotherly spat at play, which could hardly be good for morale. Vaguery was not helping the matter. After a moment’s reflection, he decided that Gawain was hardly one to beat around the bush, and would probably be alright with bluntness. “What is it that you think people hate you for saying?”</p>
<p>There was some impressive facial contortion. “Well, I know for a fact Aggravaine hates me because I-- I said-- because I didn’t-- what’s the opposite of sex positivity?”</p>
<p>“Sex negativity?” said Priamus, hopelessly confused. </p>
<p>“No, no, like-- positivity for not having sex for whatever reason. But like, not ace-positivity. Just-- I guess-- positivity for the fact that sometimes people who aren’t necessarily ace don’t have sex even though maybe they want to in theory.”</p>
<p>Priamus made a mistake, although to his credit he realised it was a mistake even as he was saying the words. “Common kindness?”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” said Gawain, “that.”</p>
<p>He winced. “So that’s what’s going on with your brother. Easy fix. Stop doing whatever you were doing that wasn’t kind.”</p>
<p>“It’s not that easy.” Gawain gazed at him with wide, stressed eyes. “I think I’ve just been-- a bad person. Because it feels <em>good</em>.” He stopped short, as if surprised by his own admission. </p>
<p>Priamus was a philosophy-student-turned-career-criminal and thus quite intrigued by discussion of the personal returns on immorality, but he reigned in his curiosity in favour of circuitously trying to get Gawain to explain what was actually wrong. “Why does it feel good? Do you like hurting other people?”
    “No, I-- I just-- I like being in charge. Even if other people don’t know I am.” He paused and scanned over his words, then amended, “No, it’s more that I <em>need </em>to be in charge. God. And if people make me feel weak, I need to rectify that. That’s why I...”</p>
<p>Priamus waited. No extrapolation was provided, so after half a minute of haunted silence he said, very gently, “What did you do?”</p>
<p>“I didn’t kill anyone or anything,” said Gawain defensively. </p>
<p>“Yeah, I know, I didn’t assume you killed someone.” Keeping his movements slow and cautious, he reached out and poked Gawain in the shoulder. “What is it you did that you’re beating yourself up about?”</p>
<p>“Oh,” said Gawain, “well. It wasn’t terrible. I mean, I’ve done worse, I don’t know why this is bothering me so much.”</p>
<p>The terrified look hidden in the lines of his face belied his words. Priamus frowned. “You can tell me. Galahad’s talking with Lucius, I’m all yours. Come on.”</p>
<p>“Alright.” Gawain took a deep breath which rattled through his body like a pennant. “Time for the ride of horrors, I guess.” And he began to talk. </p>
<p>It was a nonsensical explanation, in turns too fast and too slow, and in a very  convoluted and disordered way it recounted his activities since the no-taxes-celebration-party several days ago. Gawain, his voice thin and his eyes wild, forged on, repeating some points multiple times, contradicting himself and foregoing any chronological organization. </p>
<p>It clarified only some things, and left Priamus with some questions, like <em>how long has it been since you had a good night’s sleep? </em>and <em>are you sure you aren’t going to get in trouble for any of this?</em></p>
<p>“Wait,” he said slowly when Gawain was evidently done, or at least not speaking. “You went to Saxon’s both an hour ago and after the party?”</p>
<p> “Saxons,” Gawain repeated, as if trying to get a handle on the meaning. “Oh, no, I-- I went earlier, after the fight, and I just kind of broke a bunch of stuff. Well, I broke one machine. After the party I went--” He stopped abruptly. “During our dumb heist, in Saxons, Kay-- made me look like an idiot, or, that’s not what I mean. Inept. I felt inept. So I had to do something, I had to fix it, I had to go-- I went to his house.The manager, Hengist.” As if sure he might never speak again were he not to do so now, he barrelled on, staring carefully at the ceiling. “So I went to his house, I-- I got the address off the internet and--” There was something desperate and hungry in his expression.“I had to be wanted. I had to be in control. I asked him if he wanted to sleep with me and he did, and I didn’t-- but I said I did, so-- I had to be in control.” He broke off with a strangled gasp that was almost a sob, not quite allowed to exist, and for a long moment was silent as if out of breath. When he spoke again, his voice was startlingly calm and cold. “I think that there is something very wrong with me.”1</p>
<p>Into the silence, the tinny voice of Galahad on the laptop echoed over to the couch. <em>Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is willing to welcome you into the fold</em>, he was saying, and Priamus had a brief yet terrifying mental image of Lucius but Catholic. In front of him Gawain was staring at the floor with eyes that could not be described as anything other than dead. “Hmm,” said Priamus, in an attempt to ease Gawain back into the idea of conversation. “Well, here’s my thought for you. Or, question, I guess. Why do you do things that make you unhappy?”</p>
<p>Gawain gazed at him. “What?”
    “The purpose of life is to have fun,” declared Priamus, in a direct contradiction of the position he had argued for his <em>laurea </em>dissertation. But that was the point of a moral philosophy degree. You learned to say things you didn’t believe to your teachers and saved the useful bits for the people you actually liked. “If you’re not having fun, and you’re not happy, and you say you make other people unhappy, then you’re doing it wrong and you need to change something. Does that make sense?”</p>
<p>The parade of emotions on Gawain’s face made it very clear that something in this sentiment was not computing. </p>
<p>Sighing, Priamus crossed his arms and put on his most earnest expression. This was difficult because he was sitting on a coffee table in his living room while his new incredibly Catholic friend lectured his boss-- who was <em>not </em>a gangster, not at all-- on the perils of Triclavian heresies. But he tried nonetheless. “Look, take this case. You had sex with someone even though you knew it wouldn’t make you happy, because it-- made you feel in control, is that it?” A vague mutter of assent granted him leave to continue. “So you’re prioritizing feeling in control over feeling happy. And absolutely no one wins. Including this Hengist fellow, because you broke into his cafe and trashed it.”</p>
<p>A tiny sliver of a smile found its way onto Gawain’s mouth. “Yeah,” he said, “yeah, I guess I did do that. That was-- that was bad. I shouldn’t have done that.”</p>
<p>“You might face consequences for that,” Priamus said blithely. He didn’t really believe in consequences but was aware that other people did and thus tried to be open-minded. </p>
<p>“Don’t be ridiculous.” The smile grew into something more akin to his normal smirk. “Me? Consequences? Please.”</p>
<p><em>You seem to be inflicting many consequences on yourself</em>, Priamus very politically did not say. “When’s the last time you ate?”</p>
<p>“Uh…”</p>
<p>“Oh, dear. Come on, I’ll make you sausages.” He stood, and held out a hand to help Gawain off of the couch. It had a tendency to absorb people if they sat on it too long. That had happened to Gerry once, and he hadn’t realised for several hours-- Priamus frowned. He never thought about Gerry willingly. He forgot about his existence unless he concentrated very hard. The fact that Gawain’s near-hysterical confessionary engendered thoughts about Gerry spoke to the gravity of the situation. </p>
<p>(Gerry was not Priamus’ ex-boyfriend, because they had never dated and were not strictly speaking friends, but he was amiable and had on occasion made Friday nights about 5% more interesting than they otherwise would have been. He was perfectly nice. Priamus got very bored.)</p>
<p>    “Sausages,” repeated Gawain vaguely. “That’s a morning food.”</p>
<p>    “Well, it is morning.” Besides, in Priamus’ book there was no temporal delineation of food categories. He regularly ate mac and cheese for breakfast. “Not in a judgemental way, but is any of this sticking? You seem…”</p>
<p>    “Awful?” suggested Gawain. </p>
<p>    “Really out of it.”</p>
<p>    “I’m in it, I’m totally in it,” Gawain said unconvincingly. “I’m great. I mean, awful, but-- you changed the subject. 3:19 isn’t morning.”</p>
<p>    Priamus decided to table the subject. “It’s 3:21, so now it <em>is </em>morning.”</p>
<p>    “Oh. I guess that makes sense.” </p>
<p>    Flipping the stove on and pouring approximately half a gallon of olive oil in the pan that permanently rested there, Priamus grabbed a half-empty packet of chicken-apple sausages from the freezer and chucked them vaguely in the correct direction. A brief snippet of conversation slipped from the fridge heralding future problems in development.</p>
<p>    “When you are reborn in Christ,” Galahad was explaining, “Your many sins will be forgiven. But not by the government.”</p>
<p>    He quickly closed the door before he could hear Lucius respond, as if that would change the worrying reality of eminent baptism. “Where are you planning to sleep?” He paused. “<em>Are </em>you planning to sleep?”</p>
<p>    “I can’t go back to the apartment.” Gawain’s face was pale. “I could-- I don’t know. Oh. The library. I could go to the library. That’s open all night.”</p>
<p>    “You’re not going to the library,” Priamus said firmly. “I have slept in libraries many nights and I promise they invariably end with a librarian realising you’re asleep on a copy of Cicero and also slightly drunk. After that it’s just a downhill slide until Gianni Schicchi the illegal watch dealer picks you up from the <em>rettore</em>’s office with a hangover cure and your essay on Kant. It’s always like this.”    </p>
<p>    “I don’t think it is always like that,” Gawain equivocated, though he didn’t seem very sure of it. “What’s your proposal then?”</p>
<p>    He pointed across the room. “Couch. Sausages. Sleep. And then tomorrow there will be a pop quiz on your mental health.”</p>
<p>    “Hrrgh,” whimpered Gawain, with a shifty look like he was considering setting an alarm and climbing out the window at 5 AM. “Sure. Yes. Cool.”</p>
<p>    From the fridge came a curious rattling noise, as though a computer was undergoing a long-distance exorcism. “Fuck,” swore Priamus, dove towards it, and wrenched the door open. His laptop blinked at him angrily, informing him it would die if he did not plug it in immediately and perform a small apology ritual. Galahad’s face was still on the screen, looking calm and vaguely smug. The rotary phone sat on the cheese shelf, meek and more Catholic than normal. Priamus sighed. “Hi, guys. How’s it going?”</p>
<p>    “Fine,” Galahad said, at the same time Lucius said, “Very bad. Hellen left me because of something called ‘Original Sin,’ but also divorce is a sin, and so is marriage.”</p>
<p>    “Huh. Well, good luck.” Priamus went to grab his computer, then quickly decided against it. Lucius wasn’t dealing with theodicy well, and Priamus wanted none of it. </p>
<p>    “Sorry Lucius, my computer died, as you can hear, so I have to hang up.” He hung up. “Thank you, Galahad.”</p>
<p>    A trace of humour drifted across Galahad’s stern face. “Mhm. Are you-- is Gawain alright?”</p>
<p>    “He’s fine,” said Gawain, in a voice that was the auditory personification of a sad theatre mask.</p>
<p>    Galahad pondered this for a moment with some concern, then evidently figured that something which worked once would definitely work twice. “Have you told him it’s never too late for sinners to carry love in their hearts?”</p>
<p>    “I think it’s time for my computer to die,” Priamus noted quickly. </p>
<p>    “Bye, Galahad.” Gawain waved a loose hand at the fridge. “I would like to carry love in my heart someday.”</p>
<p>    “You can--” Galahad began to say, but then Priamus’ computer gave one final dying splutter and trundled into bleeping darkness. Then the smoke alarm went off. </p>
<p>    “Sausages,” Gawain remarked, while Priamus waved an oven mitt at the steaming pan. “I think sausages would be good.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. The Fox</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>lou (Today at 1:38 PM):<br/>&gt;some poor lawyer: um. you need a two month warning period--<br/>&gt;priamus: ohhh i get it. like im going to give you a 2 minute warning period before i start breaking shit</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii everyone we did it we finished it muahahahahaha we hope you enjoy this<br/>also we realised after writing this that they experienced friday twice. dont worry about it. it was a double friday week</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>    “First day of work, darling,” said Lynette, fixing her lipstick in the mirror as she glanced at Gareth. “Are you ready to expose some OSHA violations?”</p><p>    Gareth looked up at her and grinned. “Oh, I’ve never been more ready.” He kissed her on the cheek and slung a coat over his shoulders. “Shall we?” </p><p>    Lynette hummed and examined her makeup before taking his offered hand. “This is going to be fun.” </p><p>    The trip to Saxons’ Café was a bit longer than Gareth’s normal commute to Lionheart, but it gave the two of them time to plan. </p><p>    “I think we go for the doorways first,” proposed Lynette, popping her gum. “There’s a lot of rules about doorways. Or emergency exit routes, that’s a big one.” </p><p>    “What about first aid? I bet Hengist hasn’t updated his kits in years.” </p><p>    “Good idea, but harder to hold against him. Easier to fix. Plus, they’ve already had like ten complaints,” Lynette said, peering through the stack of papers in her hands. “So this could get us as far as we need alone.” </p><p>    “Where’d you find these even?” asked Gareth, taking the top page from Lynette. </p><p>    “Oh I just know things, Gareth,” she said, taking it back without looking. “You understand. Anyways, I think we need the measurements of at least three halls, doors, and or exit routes. Let’s hope they’re too small.”</p><p>    “You’re so hot when you talk about health and safety regulations,” Gareth said as they approached the double doors of the cafe. </p><p>    Lynette shoved the papers into her bag and stopped, smiling at Gareth. “Oh please,” she kissed him once before resting her sunglasses on her head and walking into their place of conquest. “I’m always hot.” </p><p>    Cold and impersonal lights shone overhead as the pair made their way inside, and a short, stocky man greeted them from behind a fake marble counter. </p><p>    “‘Morning. I should give you the training according to the protocol or whatever, but you probably know all that already so I’m just going to skip it. Your aprons are over there.”</p><p>    “Good morning, Mr. Hengist,” said Gareth, smiling. Lynette waved at him cheerily. </p><p>    “Guys,” Hengist said, directed at the few tired teenagers and twenty-somethings that already haunted the halls of the coffeeshop. “These are… uh… Gareth and Lynette, they’re new, treat them well. Or something.” He looked over his blinking audience and sighed. “Well anyways, we’re opening in five, so that frappuccino machine had better have been fixed by one of you rodents. Goodbye.” Hengist grimaced as he retreated in a small nondescript plywood door. </p><p>    Gareth and Lynette put on their aprons and headed for the staff room, looking for the shift board. They walked down a (non OSHA compliant) corridor, accidentally opened the door to the (non OSHA compliant) staff bathroom and finally stumbled into the (barely OSHA compliant) staff room. They checked the board.</p><p>    “Bathroom duty,” read Gareth. </p><p>    “Bitch,” said Lynette.</p><p>    “Well, at least we’ll have the time to measure it,” sighed Gareth, ever the optimist.</p><p>Fastening name tags onto their aprons and pulling out their measuring tapes stolen from IKEA, they made their way towards the bathroom. </p><p>Their measuring time was interrupted the first time barely ten minutes after they got there. A young man in a hoodie walked in, used one of the stalls, and left behind him a trail of flour that looked like it was coming out of his pockets. </p><p>“I don’t even know what to say about that,” said Lynette after the man had left. </p><p>Gareth was already moving to sweep up the flour, and shrugged. “You get used to it.” </p><p>Despite the delays, Gareth and Lynette managed to intermittently clean the bathroom while collecting evidence. Most of their shift was spent coming up with elaborate ways to inconspicuously find the heights and widths of various hallways and doors. Lynette was on a mission to find at least one satisfyingly tight emergency exit, but insisted on measuring every opening or corner they came across on the way there. </p><p>“Is this, like, a new kink or something? Should I be taking notes?” asked Gareth, crouching on one side of the measuring tape as Lynette tapped the length into her phone. </p><p>Lynette’s head snapped at him and she scoffed. “Absolutely not. That would be nerd behavior. You think I’m a nerd, Hot Hands? You think that?” </p><p>“No, of course not babe, It just seems like you’re really into this-” </p><p>“You guys measuring doorways?” interrupted a voice from behind them. They jumped and the tape snapped back into its shell. It was one of their co-workers from before, a bored-looking teenager with black nails and a chain necklace, leaning against the wall opposite them. </p><p>Lynette shot up and took an identical leaning position, staring into the kid’s eyes. “Of course not. Why would you think that? We’re on bathroom duty, why would we be measuring doorways-” she checked his name tag, “Ælfrith.”</p><p>Ælfrith nodded. “Sure. So, what, are you guys like secret door inspectors or something? Looking to get dirt on Hengist?”</p><p>“That would be ridiculous,” Gareth said, litting his eyes back and forth between Lynette and Ælfrith. He laughed nervously. “Who does that? So weird. Hengist is great. We have a completely normal level of interest in doors. Which is none, maybe.” </p><p>“Oh man, that sucks,” said Ælfrith, running a hand through his bleach-white hair. “If you <em>were</em> I would be able to tell you about the exit in the backroom that isn’t up to code. Tragic.” </p><p>Lynette tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “The, uh, backroom? Just don’t think I heard you there.” </p><p>“Second door to the left. Don’t know why you need all this but I’m down to fuck with Hengist literally any day of my life. And this place is a corporate nightmare. They deserve to get knocked down a peg, I won’t snitch.” </p><p>Lynette allowed herself a thin smile and saluted at Ælfrith, grabbing Gareth’s sleeve to pull him towards their target. </p><p>Hours later, Gareth opened a laptop on Kay’s desk displaying the exact measurements alongside state and federal regulations, laid out in a neat spreadsheet. </p><p>Kay clicked his tongue. “Well done, you two.” </p><p>    There was someone hitting his leg. This fact presented itself through a haze of half-dreamed snippets, lost in horrible incoherent thoughts and bits of memory that didn’t seem to be his own. It was like a picture book: a lake, a broken tree, something long that started and ended in red. Then the thing hitting his leg grew undeniably insistent and, with a great effort of will, he wrenched himself out of the swamp of thoughts and kicked as hard as he could. </p><p>    “Whmph,” said Priamus, and clattered backwards into the coffee table. </p><p>    Gawain blinked the fog out of his eyes and took quick stock of the situation. “Ah, fuck. How long have I been asleep?”</p><p>    “It’s just past nine.” Priamus rubbed his knee. “Why did you kick me?”</p><p>    “You were hitting me!”</p><p>    “I was prodding you.” He produced a blue mug from behind him. It had a line of writing in what Gawain (incorrectly) presumed to be Arabic, and then in English under that the motto: “<em>We Have Tea!</em>” Its contents did not smell like tea. “Drink this.”</p><p>    Too numb and brittle-feeling to protest, Gawain obliged, and then only barely managed to prevent himself from spitting the contents out immediately. “What the fuck is that?”</p><p>    “Uh…” Priamus began to list items on his fingers. “One egg, fried; a spoonful of ice cream; three shots of espresso; the sausage oil from the pan; frozen blueberries; and three ibuprofens that I ground up. You’re awake now, aren’t you?”</p><p>    “Yeah,” said Gawain miserably.</p><p>    “How are you feeling?”</p><p>    “Pretty fucking bad.”</p><p>    Priamus reclaimed his mug. “Do you have any takeaways from our conversation last night?”</p><p>    Pushing himself to an upright position, Gawain scanned his brain for the dregs of whatever it was they had talked about. He had— oh, God, he had told Priamus <em>everything</em>, hadn’t he? Why on earth had he done that? It was so embarrassing— then he glanced back at the man standing in front of him with a horrible hangover-cure concoction and a tank top advertising Gatorland, Orlando. He clearly had no sense of shame, and there was thus no point in Gawain feeling shame either. He had probably given good advice the previous night. Unfortunately Gawain could currently remember about 40% of it. “Be… nicer?” he tried. “That seems— to be frank, Priamus, that seems a pretty fucking monumental task. I can’t just— change.”</p><p>    Priamus stared at him for a long moment. “You need a day off,” he said eventually, and turned away from the couch to deposit the mug on his kitchen counter. </p><p>    Panic overtook him. He couldn’t take a day off, that was impossible, because he had told Aggravaine he didn’t take days off for something as trivial as <em>mental health</em>, and that was what had started the fight in the first place, so to take one off now would be to lose, and <em>Gawain Orkney didn’t lose. </em>Unfortunately none of these thoughts aligned themselves in a verbally comprehensible order, and all he managed to give in way of protest was: “But it’s Saturday.”</p><p>    “Sure is, buddy.” Priamus grinned at him. “Saturdays should be for recovering from Friday. Not for showing up at 9 to your subpar coffeeshop and thinking about all the reasons you’re a terrible person, which is what it looks like you’re planning to do right now. Look, you don’t even have to talk to anyone. I’ll handle it. Just come with me and stay outside, you should get some fresh air. I’ll deal with your uncle.”</p><p>    “No one deals with Kay,” said Gawain, in his most ominous voice, “Kay deals with you.”</p><p>    “You may have forgotten,” Priamus drawled, “but I <em>am </em>a marketable professional in the field of coercing people into minding their own business. I think I can handle your uncle Kay.”</p><p> </p><p>    No one showed up to work anymore apparently, but Kay supposed bitterly that this was alright, since no customers showed up either. He would have texted Bedivere to express this thought, but he was a professional who didn’t have his phone out at work except for work-related business, unlike everyone else. So he was just glumly cleaning the counter thinking glum thoughts when Priamus stalked in. </p><p>    “What the fuck do you want?” He asked, glumly. “Because if it isn’t to exchange legal tender for caffeinated goods, then I will start throwing things.”</p><p>    Priamus very casually rested one arm on the counter, which due to having been wiped down with a wet cloth recently made his sleeve damp. He smirked and pretended not to notice this. “Is that a threat, old man?”</p><p>    Instead of pointing out that they were basically the same age, Kay rolled his eyes. “Good lord. Gawain—!” Halfway through summoning Gawain to deal with this delinquent, he remembered. “God fucking damn it. Where the hell is he?”</p><p>    “That’s not the question you need to be asking,” Priamus said. This routine worked significantly better on low level career criminals, but he was determined to use his job skills somehow. </p><p>    “And what question would that be?” Kay asked flatly, sensing weakness.</p><p>    Priamus was silent a moment. “You’re going to give Gawain the day off.”</p><p>    “That’s not a question.”</p><p>    “Exactly.”</p><p>    “Right, well,” Kay began, with one of his more withering looks. “If Gawain wants the day off he can call and ask and arrange to have someone cover his shift, like every other employee.”</p><p>    This was seemingly not going well for Priamus; his suave confidence was somewhat ragged. He went to open his blazer a bit to reveal a gun, and was stymied by the lack of both gun and blazer. “Yes— well, that’s not what I’m offering.”</p><p>    <em>No good deed goes unpunished, </em>Kay reflected. He had this thought a lot around the Orkneys, especially recently. There seemed to be something up with them, which did not bode well for anyone involved, and he was hoping to stay out of it. </p><p>    “What are you offering, Priamus?”</p><p>    With this pity lead in, Priamus was back on solid ground, leaning forward and tapping his fingers absently on the register. “How good is your insurance policy on this place?” </p><p>    “Good lord.” No fucking subtlety. “Fine, whatever, he has the day off. Because I’m running a god damn summer camp here. But he has to call me and confirm this.”</p><p>    Priamus brightened, standing straighter. “Oh, well that’s no trouble he’s right outside.”</p><p>There was an awkward pause. Kay opened his mouth, but the phone behind the counter rang before he could say anything. Keeping eye contact with Priamus, he answered it. </p><p>“Oh hello Mr. Lucius, my landlord,” he said for the benefit of a one man audience. Priamus paled. “Yes, he is here actually, just loitering around the counter.”</p><p>With a rare and malice-filled smile, Kay handed Priamus the phone.</p><p>“Lucius? How did you know to call LCC?” Priamus demanded in horror.</p><p>“Through God all things are possible. Also things are going south with Hellen so I need you to meet the senator by the garage about four minutes ago. No excuses. Go in Christ.” Then he hung up. Priamus turned to give the phone back to Kay and found no one.</p><p>“Kay wait, Kay—”</p><p>    But, leaving the counter to a mostly asleep Percival, Kay was heading outside. The few customers watched curiously as he disappeared through the front door. Priamus swore, hoped everything would sort of work itself out, and darted out the back door.</p><p>    Gawain was leaning on the wall to the left of the door, coming off more too-tired-to-stand than casual. </p><p>    “Kay—” he said miserably, then stopped. </p><p>    “What the hell is going on with you all?” Kay demanded in exasperation. Who ‘you all’ meant wasn’t clear. “Is there something medically wrong?”</p><p>    Gawain wouldn’t look at him. “No. Sorry.” </p><p>    Kay shook his head. “We’ll talk about this inside. You can have a cup of coffee out of your next paycheck.”</p><p>    Not accepting this offer, but unable to object, Gawain nodded miserably. </p><p>    Kay may have been about to say something patronizing and vaguely well meaning, like <em>What am I going to do with you? </em>Before he had the chance, his cell phone rang. It was an unknown number and, knowing waiting in discomfort would make Gawain more garrulous, he accepted. “What is it?”</p><p>    A throat cleared itself on the other end before a voice, vaguely familiar, spoke. “Mr. Pendragon? This is Henry Hengist of Saxons’ Cafe. We met— ah— several days ago.”</p><p>    Kay remembered. He had enjoyed talking to Hengist because Hengist was clearly very scared of him. The timing of this call, however, did not bode well. “You’re that manager fellow?”</p><p>    “Uh, yes. Well. I’m calling because last night someone broke into our establishment and damaged some of our property.”</p><p>    “Hm,” said Kay. He could hardly pretend this wasn’t pleasant news to receive. “We here at Lionheart Coffee Co. extend our condolences and will summarily refuse to help you.”</p><p>    “That’s not what I’m calling to ask. We have security footage. Is someone named Gawain still in employment at your establishment?”</p><p>    This was the worst possible thing Kay could have heard at the present moment, and in the manner of bad things for Kay, it would soon become a bad thing for the subject of his ire. He turned a glower on Gawain, who was staring at him anxiously. “He is. What are you planning to do with this?”</p><p>    “Well…” said Hengist. He sounded as though he was trying to drawl, but it wasn’t working very well because he was slightly too polite. “I can submit it to the proper authorities. Or.” </p><p>    Kay waited. There was something in the intonation of threats that Hengist had yet to master, and he was hardly going to take pity on him. </p><p>    “Or.” Hengist cleared his throat and tried again, slightly more accurately. “Or…”</p><p>    Out of the corner of his eye, Kay caught a glimpse of Gawain’s blanched face. He was his nephew, in the end. No mercy would be provided to his persecutors. “You’ve said ‘or’ three times. I would like you to finish your sentence.”</p><p>    “Or I could submit the security footage to the proper authorities,” mumbled Hengist. </p><p>    Panache was the problem, Kay reflected. Say what you liked about Lucius, he had panache. He had flair. It was horrible to be on the receiving end of it, but it existed. Hengist had none of those things, and Kay was not inclined to be gracious. The blood was in the water. “You could submit it to the proper authorities,” he said brightly. “You must be looking for something in return. Tell me.”</p><p>    “I want you to fire him.”</p><p>    “Fire Gawain?” Kay left a brief pause to indicate he was thinking about it, during which he saw Gawain pale even further. “No. Do you know why?”</p><p>    “Why?” said Hengist, whose threatening phonecall had been waylaid by its intended victim, and who was not sure what was happening anymore. </p><p>    <em>You wanted a drawl</em>? thought Kay vindictively. <em>I’ll show you a proper drawl. </em>“Because… because if you do… I’ll have to do something with all these pictures I have of how small your hallways are. Not up to code, are they, Henry Hengist? Skimped a bit, didn’t you?”</p><p>    “Uh oh,” said Hengist, out loud. </p><p>    Kay grinned. “So that’s why you’re not going to do anything. I have ways and I have means, Mr. Hengist, and I will utilize those ways and means if you so much as breathe a <em>word</em> of what happened on that security footage to <em>anyone. </em>I will, of course, arrange for all financial losses to be covered at the expense of the employee in question, and it will not happen again. But don’t try to threaten me.”</p><p>    “Okay,” said Hengist meekly. “But, um, one problem.”
    “Oh?”</p><p>    “I have— people I know— in the university administration and I <em>may </em>have already sent some very angry emails this morning.”</p><p>    “Shit,” said Kay.</p><p>    “I think we can— reach an accord,” Hengist continued. “Mutual silence? From now on? Please don’t report me, Mr. Pendragon.”</p><p>    “Mutual silence is acceptable,” Kay snapped. “Have a day. Goodbye.”</p><p>    He hung up. Then, as kindly as he could, he recounted the details of the call.</p><p>    “So they know,” said Gawain dumbly. “He already sent the security footage to the— whoever it is he knows in the admin. They know I, uh, had a bit of a freak-out.”</p><p>    Kay might have tried to placate him. “You’re probably going to be expelled,” he said instead. </p><p>    “Expelled? No, I— I can’t— no, they wouldn’t expel me. I’ll figure it out. I’ll figure something out. I always—” </p><p>    It was at this horribly apt moment that his phone began to vibrate. Startled, Gawain patted his pockets before eventually producing it and pressing accept on the last ring, the name <em>Wirnt von Grafeburg </em>barely registering in his mind. “Hello?”</p><p>    There was a pause. Gawain’s face underwent several expressions in quick succession, starting at his default abject misery and winding up at an impenetrable blank slate of a gaze. After about a minute of listening to the voice on the other end, he spoke again. “Yes. Yes, that’s true.” Silence. “Absolutely, Coach. Yes. Thank you for telling me.” His mouth twitched once, briefly, and then the mask slid back over his features. “I’ll manage somehow! Of course, I recognize this was horrible of me, and I’m taking all the necessary steps to fix the situation. I’m very grateful to you, I’d like to say.” One last dreadful gap stretched out before he said, “That means a lot. Of course. Have a wonderful day.” Then he pressed <em>End Call </em>and, very slowly, placed the phone face down on the counter in front of him. “I’m going to lose my scholarship,” he said. </p><p>    “Ah,” said Kay. </p><p>    “I’m getting dropped from the teams. And my scholarship is athletic. I can’t pay for school anymore. Not school and the flat.”</p><p>    “But you’re not getting expelled,” pointed out Kay, who was at the best of times as comforting as an eel.</p><p>    Gawain nodded. “Yeah. Yeah I’m not getting expelled. So it could be worse. And this isn’t anything I don’t des—” Then with a strangled laugh, he burst into tears.</p><p>    “Aw, fuck,” Kay grimaced. “Shit.” He briefly assessed the situation, including the trio of customers looking at the counter with concern. “Kitchen. Now. Get.”</p><p>    Percival, emerging from sleepiness to say something like “oh, no!” found himself manning the entire coffeeshop as Gawain and Kay disappeared into the kitchen, which wasn’t really another room and barely offered a modicum of privacy, but was probably better than nothing.</p><p>    “Sit,” Kay said, pointing at the stool for reaching things in high cupboards. Gawain sat. He had the back of one hand pressed against his eyes, the other a fist at his side, trying very hard to stop crying and not remotely succeeding. There being no other stool, Kay reluctantly sat across from him on the floor. The space was wide enough to do so because their place <em>was</em> up to code, god damn it. </p><p>    “I don’t— I don’t know what I can do,” Gawain admitted, before an honest to god sob broke through his gossamer-thin self control. </p><p>    <em>So this is actually happening, </em>Kay thought but didn’t say aloud. He sighed. “Look, this isn’t the end of the world. You fucked up big time, but you’ve been in worse spots, if we’re being honest, and I’ll— God. I’ll help you figure this out.”</p><p>    “There’s no point,” he protested, pressing both palms to his eyes shakily. “There’s no— <em>stop </em>crying— there's no point! This is because I— I fucked up I deserve this. I’m not— there’s no figuring out how I can keep going to the, the school where everyone hates me and living with my brothers who all fucking <em>hate </em>me!”</p><p>    “What the hell are you talking about?” Kay considered giving him a pat on the shoulder and decided against it. </p><p>“Everyone hates, hates me because I’m a bad person, and—” here his voice shrunk to a choked whisper, “And everyone can <em>hear</em> me—!”</p><p>“There are six people maximum in this building, and two of them are us,” Kay reasoned. “Not a big deal. Why do you think you’re a bad person and everyone hates you?”</p><p>“They’re going to tell everyone,” Gawain said, still in a rather pathetic stage whisper. “They’re going to— I <em>don’t</em> cry, Kay! I don’t. Not since I was eleven.”</p><p>“Uh huh. Why do you think you’re a bad person and everyone hates you?”</p><p>Gawain sniffed. “I’m mean.”</p><p>“Uh huh.”</p><p>“I argued with Agravaine and he said I’m mean and he hates me. And I broke a bunch of stuff in Saxons, and— and I’m a manipulative control-freak and I slept with Hengist.”</p><p>There was a painfully long silence filled with muffled sobs and someone in the front pushing a chair back. “What?” Kay said finally. “You—” </p><p>But Gawain was so awfully miserable. Kay counted a few seconds and tried again. “I think you'd better explain that in, uh, no detail.”</p><p>Gawain kept shifting, like he wanted to tuck his legs against his chest but counted this as too great an ignominy. “You— you embarrassed me. In Saxons. I had to— I wanted to have— power, I don’t know it’s <em>stupid.</em>”</p><p>“Did you?”</p><p>“What?” he blinked, as if tears weren’t a renewable resource. “No. It felt bad. I do things that make me unhappy I, I guess.”</p><p>Putting aside the emotion of <em>I’m going to commit an actual murder, </em>with great effort, Kay tried to be productive. “Alright why don’t you— take a few deep breaths.” There, that would give him a moment to think. “If the problem is that you’re mean or whatever just stop being mean and apologize. Your brothers will forgive you.”</p><p>Finally Gawain looked up at him, glaring out through now damp brown curls. “I can't just— <em>decide</em> to do that, Kay I— can’t just let go!”</p><p>Kay counted a few seconds. “Alright. This is unproductive unless you calm down. I’m going to set the oven timer to three—” he looked again. “Eight minutes to wallow in self pity.” He set the timer.</p><p>If he privately found this patronizing, Gawain didn’t say, surrendering to indignity. After eight minutes of sobbing and recounting his many sins and misfortunes with no particular relevance or clarity, the timer went off. </p><p>“Times up. Take some deep breaths and then we’re moving on.”</p><p>Gawain looked skeptical. “Right yeah I’ll just stop, I’ll just stop crying it’s not like I’ve— been trying to do that this whole time, Kay.”  </p><p>“Be nice.”</p><p>“Sorry,” he said, voice small again. “Sorry. Sorry.”</p><p>“You’re fine,” Kay stated blankly, despite all evidence to the contrary. “Do you want,” he winced internally, “a hug or something?”</p><p>Gawain considered this for long enough that Kay regretted suggesting it. “Um. I don’t— I don’t know. Yes.”</p><p>“Right, well,” Kay tried with little success to sound reassuring. “Come on then.”</p><p>Gawain was always smaller than one remembered, Kay thought, folding him into an awkward hug. He mumbled something like thank you, and Kay ineptly patted him on the back a few times.</p><p> “I don’t know what I can do,” Gawain said again, but sounded slightly less hopeless. </p><p>Then his phone buzzed. “Text,” said Gawain. “I’ve got a text. I should— I should see who’s texting me.”</p><p>    “Do that, then,” said Kay gently. He wished desperately that Bedivere were here. “I’ll still be here when you finish your text business.”</p><p>    Gawain fumbled for his phone and stared at it for several minutes. “Oh, it’s Derek,” he said vaguely. </p><p>    “Derek?”</p><p>    “Yeah, Derek. Apparently they all got an email from the coach. He wants to know if I’m okay. That’s— nice of him.” For a second he sounded as if he would start crying again. “That’s really nice of him. What do I say? Do I say I’m okay?”</p><p>    “I’m not going to direct your personal affairs.”</p><p>    “I’ll just— tell him I lost my scholarship but I’ll figure it out,” said Gawain, with a measure of steel in his voice. “I can do this.” </p><p>    He typed for a second. Kay watched him, unsure whether to be comforting or realistic. Eventually he opted for realistic. “You won’t get a loan after this. How are you going to pay for the last semester?”</p><p>    “I don’t fucking know, Kay!” said Gawain, still looking at his phone, his voicing rising slightly. “I’m trying very hard not to think about it and just deal with what’s in front of me. And that’s Derek.” His phone buzzed again. “Now it’s Derek and Fergus. And— and Ysabele. Derek and Fergus and Ysabele. I can deal with this. I’ll tell them I’m fine.”</p><p>    “So you're going to lie to them?” Kay asked without judgement. “Wasn’t that one of the things you regretted doing?”</p><p>    Gawain froze. “But I don’t— they’re not my <em>friends</em> or anything! They’re just people I know! I can’t just unload my life on them or whatever.”</p><p>    “You’re worried about seeming weak, aren’t you?”</p><p>    Before Gawain could provide some semblance of an answer, there was a knock from the door frame. Not the actual door, because there was no actual door, but from someone who clearly felt bad about barging through the curtain into the horrible mess that was sprawled across the kitchen floor. That someone, when Kay pulled back the curtain, turned out to be three someones, and also happened to be the remaining non-Perceval someones in Kay’s count of the six people in the shop. “Hey,” said Ragnelle uncertainly, their eyebrows knitting in their forehead. Then, to Kay, who seemed to have taken on a chaperonial role: “Could we talk to Gawain for a sec?”</p><p>    “He’s all yours,” said Gawain, very sadly. The realities of pouring out his many misdeeds to Kay in the kitchen, while in complete auditory range of the customers, was setting in. </p><p>    Slightly suspicious of civilians behind the counter, but willing to make sacrifices in the current circumstances, Kay scooted out. The three customers moved in to stand in a ring around Gawain, who stared up at them blearily. </p><p>    “Ragnelle. Joconde. Cade,” he said, like he was naming his executioners. “How— much did you hear?”</p><p>    “Only some!” Ragnelle said reassuringly. Gawain couldn’t tell if they were lying, and was too dedicated to this deduction to notice Joconde disappear and briefly reappear, before handing him a paper cup.</p><p>    Suspicious from previous experiences that morning, Gawain took it with some hesitance. “Coffee?”</p><p>    “Water,” she said dryly. </p><p>    “...oh.”</p><p>    “So…” Joconde began, “we heard the bit about losing your scholarship. Also, and more saliently, I did get a text from Ysabele asking if I’d heard that you’d gotten dropped from the equestrian team and thus lost your scholar—”</p><p>    “Don’t tell him that!” Cade said, at the look of severe embarrassment on Gawain’s face. “Forget about that. Gawain, forget everything.”</p><p>    “Who’s Gawain?” said Gawain, with a grimaced attempt at a joking smile. </p><p>    The three of them tittered politely. Then Ragnelle, their face sympathetic, dropped down to the floor beside him. “I hope this whole thing doesn’t seem like prying. You just seem like you’re having a hard time right now.”</p><p>    “Deceptive use of a, a passive phrasing,” he suggested with some bitter self effacement. “Thank you, I’m sorry.” </p><p>    “Sorry for what?” said Cade, nudging him with one foot. “You don’t have anything to apologize for! This is what friends are for, you know.”</p><p>    He froze sort of uncomfortably at that. “Oh. Fuck. Sorry. Fuck. We are— we’re friends.”</p><p>    “Right,” said Joconde somewhere between humour and sympathy. “We’re all up to speed then.” She paused. “Why are you making that face?” </p><p>    Gawain tried to stop his face from doing whatever it was doing. “What face?”</p><p>    “The face like you’re thinking about running out the back door really really quickly.”</p><p>    Ragnelle nodded and gestured at his face. “Kinda… vulpine.”</p><p>    “Vulpine. Right.” He ran a hand through lightly tangled curls, and it came to rest on his neck, like this was a familiar, nervous habit. “I— I’ve been sort of an— an asshole recently.” </p><p>    “What?” said Joconde, frowning. “You’ve been fine, Gawain! Honestly, I know you’re going through some stuff, but you’ve never been anything but lovely to me.”</p><p>    Maybe trying to stall, Gawain took a sip from the paper cup and frowned. “I hate water.”</p><p>    “What do you mean you hate water? It’s water,” Cade wondered aloud.</p><p>    “It tastes gross.” He took another drink. “I’ve— feel like I’ve been a traitor.”</p><p>    “To water?” said Ragnelle, giggling slightly.</p><p>    But he was just looking down at his cup with a slightly sick expression. “I mean that I, I don’t know. I only ever say I’m an IR major and—” </p><p>    The three of them gave identical frowns. “What?” said Cade.</p><p>    “I don’t want— I don’t want people to know I’m also a WGS major. I’m not exactly sure why,” he admitted like he was forcing the words out through his teeth. “And I act like— I’m bad at explaining.”</p><p>    <em>No you aren’t</em>, a less kind audience may have pointed out. <em>You’re quite eloquent and we all know that, you just don’t actually want to be understood.</em> But these were his friends, so they waited for him to elaborate. </p><p>    “I think,” he said eventually, the breathiness in his voice mellowing into the calm of reflectiveness, “that perhaps some part of me feels as though passing as cis all the time with everyone is a grand jest, and I’m winning. And to relax that guard, therefore, is to lose. I— I really made it through years of WGS classes without applying any of it to myself, didn’t I?”</p><p>    They sat with this statement for a moment in collective pondering. Before the silence could grow too oppressive, Gawain absently shook the cup and made a dismayed look at how much seemed to be left. Ragnelle laughed generously. “Are you saying you managed to coach me through my gender crisis while you ignored your own crisis the entire time?” they said. “Bro, that’s kind of impressive. I’m really sorry, though. Thanks for talking about it with us.”</p><p>    Joconde and Cade joined them on the floor, apparently deciding they were in it for the long haul. Joconde gave him a slightly sad smile. “Is it really that bad to be a WGS major?” she said, but her tone was light enough to take most of the sting out of it.</p><p>    “No! No—” He paused to consider his further answer. “Not for other people. I don’t know what that means, but— people think of me differently. If they think I— I care about things, then everything isn’t a game anymore. Like— if the joke isn’t on life, it’s on me. And that's weakness.”</p><p>    Cade blinked at him. “What? That’s not— Gawain, I’m gonna say something really corny, but I think being trans is stronger than being cis. I know that’s, like, very motivational poster. But—”</p><p>    “I’m not transphobic!” cut in Gawain. “I’m just— I don’t know. It’s just a facet of some broader stuff I guess I’ve been dealing with. And you guys were—” He broke off and gave a chuckle. “Sorry, you guys showed up at the exact right moment to get a lot of really weird deep shit. Oh, this is bad, actually. This is a bad conversation. I shouldn’t have told you any of this.”</p><p>    “On the contrary,” Ragnelle said with a clever look, “If you’re afraid of being honest and vulnerability I’d say the solution is to do that a bit. You know we’re always happy to talk through this stuff— okay.” They switched track abruptly. “Do you really not drink <em>anything</em> that isn’t coffee or alcohol? How are your organs, like, extant?”</p><p>    “Sometimes I put the alcohol <em>in </em>the coffee,” said Gawain piteously, as though this was a third type of liquid.</p><p>    “If you keep making faces I’m taking my water back,” Joconde threatened. “Also, yeah. You can talk about this seriously.” </p><p>    He batted his hands vaguely in front of his face. “No, no. I mean, thank you, but maybe on the floor of the kitchen while my uncle bullies Perceval outside and also I’ve lost my entire future is not the best time or place.” He hiccuped. “But— really, thank you. Something to deal with in the future, I guess. A problem for tomorrow Gawain. Today Gawain has to figure out how to maybe steal a degree. Can you do that?”</p><p>    “Today Gawain is furloughing life problems for tomorrow. If they’re dropping you now, you still have a few weeks before anything is due, so you can afford to take today off,” Joconde said, in a tone which didn’t suggest disagreement. </p><p>Gawain tried to protest. He tried to open his mouth and point out all the reasons he really couldn't do that. And yet all he managed to do was give a small, tired nod and let himself be pulled to his feet. They escorted him gently out of the kitchen and into the main room of Lionheart Coffee Co, where they deposited him on Gaheris' bean bag in the corner and wrapped his shoulders in what seemed to be Cade's trenchcoat.</p><p> Time passed. He took deep breaths and watched the three of them do their homework. It was almost pleasant, if he forgot all of the baggage of being himself and absorbed the atmosphere of the morning. It was almost normal.</p><p> </p><p>Aggravaine got a text from Bedivere halfway through his Abstract Algebra class. It was long, which was automatically worrying, and furthermore it used correct punctuation. Surreptitiously slipping his phone out of his pocket, he flipped it on under his desk and tried to look unnoticeable. </p><p>
  <em>Hey, Aggs. I wanted to apologize on behalf of Kay. I know he’s been treating you more brusquely than normal, and you deserve to know that there’s more going on. I know this sounds harsh, but it’s not about you, and I’m sorry he’s been taking it out on you. LCC is having a hard time right now with Saxons’ and everything, and (please don’t tell anyone this) we’re probably going to go out of business within the next two months unless we get really lucky. So, I’m sorry Kay’s being snappish, and I need you to know it’s not your fault. Proud to be your uncle &lt;3</em>
</p><p>Aggravaine felt his face twist in an expression somewhere between dismay and comfort. The relief of it not being about him was taking second place to the concern of it being about Lionheart Coffee Co. going bankrupt, which was hardly an optimal situation, even if he wound up with other work. </p><p>“Matrices,” Professor Troy was saying, up by the whiteboard. “More matrices.” He paused and surveyed the class. “Now, you may not know this, but I am particularly fond of matrices. It was in 1947 that my father—”</p><p>Dismissing Professor Troy’s story about his father taking him to the boardwalk (he had heard it three times before and it was clearly false; Troy couldn’t have been older than thirty), Aggravaine slumped down in his seat, trying to fathom an existence without his uncle’s awful coffeeshop. The concept stung at him more than he would have expected. Oh, it was a horrible little place, but it was also where his entire family congregated like a village green of old, where his brothers caused havoc and his aunt Guinevere periodically appeared with all the ceremony of a queen entering her court. Even if he didn’t work there anymore, it would hurt to lose it. </p><p>“—then that we came across a Frenchman, recently ejected from Napoleon’s armies, he was very old, you see, and—”</p><p>If Lionheart was struggling, you could be sure that weird tea shop down the road was as well, Aggravaine reflected. Maybe that was the bright side of this tragedy. The French would also be driven out of business. </p><p>“—Alexander the Great—”</p><p>An idea weaselled its way into Aggravaine’s mind. It was a horrid idea, full of things that involved associating with French people, but it was an idea nonetheless. Lionheart was struggling. Liberthé was probably also struggling. Rent was expensive and Lucius was a rat bastard with a dumb white blazer who looked like he sold used cars at an upscale casino. Saxons made coffee, sort of, and they made tea, if you held your nose and didn’t look up the ingredients. </p><p>Sighing and feeling like a martyr, suffering arrow-wounds for the good of the people, he pulled out his phone once more and scrolled through his contacts to find a number he had never once texted of his own volition. </p><p>Aggs: <em>hey you french asshole</em></p><p>Aggs: <em>this is important im not just bullying you</em></p><p>Lionel: <em>i believe neither that u have anything important nor arent bullying me but go on i guess. Is it about gawain </em></p><p>Aggs: <em>ew what no</em></p><p>Aggs: <em>literally never mention my brother to me again you whore</em></p><p><em>That was mean</em>, the little voice in his head said. <em>Especially after your— conversation— with Gawain last night. </em>He felt slightly bad, but the concept of apologizing to Lionel was appalling. And besides, he didn’t seem to take it personally.</p><p>Lionel:<em> lol whatever loser. What do u want then</em> </p><p>Aggs: <em>how are you guys over at the tea shop doing like. Financially</em></p><p>Lionel: <em>im not gonna share trade secrets with u and ur filthy coffeeshop</em></p><p>Lionel: <em>jk idgaf. Were doing bad lol</em></p><p>Aggs: <em>yeah so are we</em></p><p>Aggs: <em>so i was thinking</em></p><p>Aggs: <em>could we like</em></p><p>Aggs: <em>merge</em></p><p>Lionel: <em>OH</em></p><p>Lionel: <em>like when the game store and the comics store by my house were both going under so they moved in together and just became a games AND comics store bc they appealed to the same demographic and it was bad business practice to sandwich the post office in b/w them instead of just consolidating their products?</em></p><p>Aggs: <em>youre weird</em></p><p>Aggs: <em>but yeah</em></p><p>Aggs: <em>like that i guess</em></p><p>Lionel: <em>ill</em></p><p>Lionel:<em> ask vivian ttyl</em></p><p>Aggs: <em>cool</em></p><p>Aggs: <em>bye</em></p><p>    He settled back in his chair and had a sensation he’d been feeling a lot in the last few days. It was unusual. It was the feeling of having done something productive. Aggravaine smiled, and tuned back in to Professor Christian Troy’s shockingly violent Summer of 1947 Boardwalk Story.</p><p> </p><p>    Friday trickled into Saturday. Saturday lurched into Sunday. Various events happened in the interim. </p><p>    The first event that happened was a long and stressed phonecall between Viviane du Lac, proprietor of <em>Fleurs de Liberthé</em>, and Kay Pendragon, general manager of <em>Lionheart Coffee Co. </em>Both of them opened the call with expressions of bemusement that their least competent employees had, behind their back, engineered some kind of a competent scheme. “I’m proud of Aggravaine,” Kay told Bedivere gruffly, when he had finally hung up with Viviane. About a mile and a half away, Viviane was having a similar conversation in her apartment with Morgan about Lionel. </p><p>    The second event that happened was that, very late Friday night, Gawain managed to pull himself out of the haze of self-pity and self-hatred long enough to send a text. It was exhausting. It was to Agravaine, and read:</p><p>    Gawain: <em> hey Aggs i know i really fucked up and wondered if you’d be willing to talk. Over the phone or text would be fine if u dont like want to see me which i get. I'm not asking you to forgive me or let it go i just wanted to talk. </em></p><p>He shoved the phone back in his pocket as soon as he hit send, not able to stomach staring at the message and waiting. The warm orangey light from the floor lamp in Cade’s dorm room washed everything in a not unpleasant way. </p><p>When asked a few hours before where he would go when the coffee shop closed, Gawain had tried to vaguely assure them all that he could crash on a friend's couch. They asked if this friend was home, and he had somewhat groggily told them that no, his friend had been called away to do violence at his crime job because the crime emperor was getting divorced and converting to Catholicism and someone had to violence about it.</p><p>    Cade had promptly invited him to stay at Cade’s dorm. It wasn’t a single but the roommate, who was also named Cade and who, unbeknownst to Cade 1, Gawain had once put in the ER for mostly justified reasons, was on a weekend snowboarding retreat. To Gawain’s disappointment, though he couldn't say why this was disappointing, there weren’t bunk beds, just too small regular beds across from each other. </p><p>    Currently, he was sitting up against Cade’s gigantic Gengar plushie carrying out a stilted conversation while Cade did work. He probably had work too, but he didn’t want to think about it. “I texted my brother,” he announced, because then Cade would say something like good job, and he wanted someone to say that to him.</p><p>    “What did you say?” Cade asked.</p><p>    <em>Fuck! </em>“Just asked if he was willing to talk.”</p><p>    “That’s a good start.”</p><p>    “Thank you!”</p><p>    They remained in companionable quiet for a while. Gawain stared at the ceiling, listening to the scratching of a pencil, the air conditioner whirring, the music faintly leaking from Cade’s headphones. </p><p>    Then, like the barking of hell hounds come to take his soul, Gawain's ringtone sounded from his pocket. Cade stood abruptly, shot him an encouraging smile, and said, “I’m going to go to the vending machine, back in a bit.” </p><p>    “It’s just you and me, Gengar,” Gawain said grimly, fishing out his phone. He wasn’t familiar with pokemon as a concept, but Cade had introduced them. Gawain answered the phone without even looking at the screen, could tell instantly just from the so-familiar ambient noises that Agravaine was at the apartment.</p><p>    “Thank you,” Gawain said into the now deafening empty room. “For calling.”</p><p>    “You wanted to talk?” He was suspicious, but not angry. Better than nothing.</p><p>    “Yeah, I—” He paused. Took a deep breath. Exhaled the deep breath and took another one. “I’ll start with the easy ones. I said some really awful things to you yesterday.”</p><p>    “Like calling me a mediocre loser?” Aggravaine said evenly.</p><p>    “I—” He sucked in a breath, unsure what he thought it would do, except that was how he’d react to someone hitting him with a baseball bat, which was how it felt hearing his own words again. “I’m sorry. I don’t— I don’t think that.” </p><p>    “You do, though,” said Aggravaine. His voice sounded curiously untroubled. “I don’t do the things you do and you judge me for it. I’ve come to terms with that. If you want to say sorry, though, then it would be highly warranted.”</p><p>    “I am. I am sorry, I’m sorry for everything I said and— and for being an asshole, in general, I really—” he’d been worried that he would start crying again. Instead of feeling like that, Gawain was considering those peasants in medieval France who started dancing till they died. He was mentally calculating plane ticket prices to Antarctica. He wondered if there was a witch in the woods who would be willing to turn him into a frog. “I’m sorry,” he repeated lamely. </p><p>    There was a pause. Then, in a very small voice which belied his earlier nonchalance, Aggravaine said, “Thank you.”</p><p>    That was something, it was definitely something, Gawain reflected faintly. Then, feeling distinctly ill: “I guess now is as bad a time as any to— to tell you I lost my scholarship.”</p><p>    Agravaine didn’t say anything for a beat.</p><p>    “I’m gonna figure something out. I’m sorry. I’ll fix it,” Gawain said quickly, not really believing himself. </p><p>    “You have a lot of things to apologize to me for, but that is not one of them.”</p><p>    “Oh.” His head felt foggy. Words were something he was supposed to be good at. Was this what crying did, rotted your whole brain? “Thank you. I— I’m really losing it this week. Month. Year,”</p><p>    “Twenty three years,” Agravaine supplied helpfully. </p><p>    “I don’t think I was a, a toxic baby. Probably not?” He shook his head. “Sorry. I meant to say that— that I’m going to get my shit together.” Oh no, was he? That sounded exhausting. But Gawain had already said it. </p><p>    “What does—” There was a burst of static on the other end of the phone, which probably meant Aggravaine had gone into his room, which had terrible reception because it was an oversized closet. “What does that mean?”</p><p>    “As a person? I guess I don’t, I don’t know,” he admitted. “I’m not sure yet. Apparently there is a great deal wrong with me. And you don’t— I’m not asking you to forgive me.” </p><p>    “Mhm.”</p><p>    Gawain floundered. He had said all of the things he was supposed to say, and they still didn’t seem to be getting him anywhere. This was unheard of. Aggravaine wasn’t even crying, which he normally did religiously! Something was very amiss in the Orkney household. “Um, so… that’s… that’s all I’ve got. I hope you’re doing alright.”</p><p>    “Okay,” said Aggravaine, “thank you for apologizing. Are you— I mean— I don’t want to know whose apartment you’re at, but are you safe for tonight?”</p><p>    The implications in Aggravaine’s words churned in Gawain’s stomach, gnashing their teeth at the horrible awful anchor-heavy recognition that he truly didn’t have any normal, entirely non-sexual friendships. He shoved that thought aside and tried not to worry about it. “Yeah, I’m at Cade’s dorm. I’m sleeping on the floor. There’s a funny purple plushy here,” he added, in case Gengar could salvage his relationship with his brother for him. </p><p>    “Nice,” said Aggravaine. “Anyway, I’m gonna go, we’re making brownies with Claire.”</p><p>    “That’s great. Have a good night. Aggs.” He was about to hang up when something else occurred to him. “Oh! Wait, I— I wanted to say congratulations on your possible intern thing. I’m rooting for you. That would be really cool. You— you work really hard and you deserve it.”</p><p>    “Aw. Thanks.” Aggravaine sounded surprised. “I was worried— nevermind. Thank you. Stay safe, Gawain. Bye.”</p><p>    The call clicked off. Gawain leaned back against Gengar, breathing in and closing his eyes. “Thanks, Gengar,” he said, “you’re my only real friend.”</p><p> </p><p>    The third event that happened was that Gaheris went to see a movie. It was supposed to be something on 19th century Vietnamese politics, but he was the only person who bought tickets to it, and because he sat in the highest corner of the cinema, the operator didn’t see him and assumed no one had shown up. It took him thirty minutes of staring silently at the screen wondering if his family was falling apart to realise he hadn’t been the victim of minimalist performance art, and there was in fact a mistake. Instead of solving it he went to get boba. That was the highlight of his weekend. </p><p> </p><p>    Monday dawned with an overcast sky and too much paperwork. Tuesday passed, and so did Wednesday, and the rest of the days happened as well. Kay Pendragon and Viviane du Lac scrambled from location to location, first <em>Lionheart </em>and then, when the atmosphere was pronounced too depressing, the back room of <em>Fleurs de Liberthé</em>, and then to multiple lawyers’ offices and also the city council board. Bureaucracy, which mandated a two-month notification period for changes of commercial residence, was foiled by Priamus, who was scary, and more broadly by Lucius, who was very excited to be able to rent his building to anyone other than its current occupants. </p><p>    <em>Fleurs de Liberthé </em>sat a block up from where <em>Lionheart </em>had, until very recently, lurked. It was a larger property, which was why Kay and Viviane had opted to combine their merchandise there despite the small extra distance from campus. They sold mediocre flowers and very high quality tea, which appealed to a very specific demographic of the student population that was not the majority. The staff of the establishment that had previously been <em>Lionheart Coffee Co. </em>sold very low quality coffee, but drew a much larger crowd of students who wanted somewhere cheap and vaguely pleasant to do their homework. </p><p>    It was still called <em>Fleurs de Liberthé. </em>Its employees trundled through the door the following Monday, uncertain exactly how this newest venture would pan out, and dressed in a motley combination of aprons. They had been given very little warning for the change, and besides many of them had had very stressful weeks for non-commercial reasons (save Aggravaine, who was riding on a high of a successful definitely-not-a-job-interview, and also was now no longer employed as a barista). </p><p>    The first shift at the merged location was manned by Lionel, Lancelot, Gawain, Kay, and Viviane herself. None of them was in a coherent frame of mind. Lionel spilt coffee on a thirteen-year-old boy and then poured water on him to try to help with that. Kay set a bouquet of flowers on fire. Perceval was, inexplicably, present and unhelpful. </p><p>    At the end of the first three hours, Gawain made a decision. The decision was Lancelot-shaped and tinged with discomfort, but it was a decision that had to be made, because he was trying to do things like apologize to people. In a lull between customers, he edged over to the cramped flower counter and gave an awkward wave. “Hi.”</p><p>    Lancelot looked up, looked back down at the flowers, and then looked up at him again. “Hi. Are you— I mean— hi.”</p><p>    “I was wondering if we could, ah, talk briefly?” said Gawain. He hated this newfound trend of words not working for him as well as they usually did. </p><p>    “It’s just you, me, and the roses,” mumbled Lancelot, gesturing vaguely at the counter with a pair of garden clippers. </p><p>    “Cool.” Gawain forced himself to lean casually on the counter, propped up by his elbows, instead of sliding to the floor slowly in discomfort. “So, I know you’re mad at me. Or something.”</p><p>    “Ah— hmm,” said Lancelot coherently.</p><p>    “And I thought—” Gawain stopped. A brief memory flashed across his mind of him and Lancelot fleeing Saxons’ together, laughing, grinning, and tumbling to a halt on the sidewalk. Lancelot had given him the widest smile anyone had ever given him and pulled him into a hug, which had been deeply disconcerting. “I thought we were maybe friends.”</p><p>    “Class friends.” There was a nasty <em>click </em>as Lancelot beheaded a rose. “Yeah. We were, I guess.”</p><p>    “So can I ask…” Gawain took a deep breath. “What did I do? I don’t know what I did. I’m really sorry, Lancelot, I don’t know what I did.”</p><p>    “You didn’t do anything. You didn’t do anything to me, just— ow.” He winced. His latest attack on the rose had collateral damage. “I started to think, maybe you aren’t— a good person.”</p><p>    “Oh.” Here Gawain did sink onto a nearby stool, with relief more than anything. “Then you found out before I did.” He paused. “Fuck, sorry, are you bleeding?” </p><p>    “It’s fine, this happens all the time,” said Lancelot, shoving his bleeding finger into his mouth and glancing around nervously in case anyone was watching other than Gawain, who had no grounds on which to judge him. “Don’t worry about it. Anyway. I guess we’re coworkers now. That’s fun.”</p><p>    “Yeah,” said Gawain, and then, in a rush of words: “I’m trying, I mean I’m trying to be better, or be not worse, or fix whatever it is I did, or— I don’t know, but I’m trying.”</p><p>    Lancelot wrung his hand and then wiped it on his apron before answering. “Okay,” he said. “Hey, would you take out the trash bag here? It’s full and I don’t have anywhere to put the stems. Trash is out back.”</p><p>    “Yeah, of course.” Gawain stood, breathing out a shaky breath, and accepted the plastic bag of flower waste that Lancelot handed to him without looking him in the face. “I’ll— see you around.” Then, without waiting to hear Lancelot’s response, he fled towards the back. </p><p>    He had just tossed the bag unceremoniously in the large dumpster outside when he became aware of a rattling noise. It sounded like a very organic vacuum cleaner was gargling compost at the bottom of the dumpster. He stood on his tiptoes and just managed to peer over the edge. </p><p>    A stained orange face stared back at him. </p><p>    “Hey, fox,” he said, a smile pulling at his face. “How are you doing in there?”</p><p>    The fox blinked at him, long and slow. It didn’t look afraid. If anything, it looked supercilious. Then, with a swish of its tail, it went back to its chicken bones. </p><p>    “I’ll take that as pretty good,” said Gawain. “Guess it’s a good day to be a fox. Less of a good day to be a Gawain.”</p><p>    Making a disgusting snorting noise, the fox flicked a banana peel at him. </p><p>    “Thanks. You’re a real one.” He paused, and gazed at it more attentively. “You got a name? Or are you just Fox?” There was no response to this. “Or maybe since you’re behind <em>Fleurs de Liberthé </em>you’re a French fox. A renard. I’ll call you Renard, how’s that?”</p><p>    Renard crunched down on a bone of undisclosed origin and gave him a patronizing look. Gawain nodded at him as seriously as he could, then winked. “I won’t tell anyone you’re out here. Have a good day, Renard the fox.”</p><p>    Then he went back to work.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>theres gonna be one more long chronological multichapter fic after this!! we hope you enjoyed and please let us know your thoughts &lt;3</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>please comment ily get some sleep and hydrate</p></blockquote></div></div>
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